From brianlanning at gmail.com Mon Mar 1 06:58:09 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 06:58:09 -0600 Subject: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx In-Reply-To: <01f101cab8fa$601f9de0$748b11ac@SCZ.ST.COM> References: <01f101cab8fa$601f9de0$748b11ac@SCZ.ST.COM> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003010458w3e3810d6q23cdb4145e211f10@mail.gmail.com> On Sun, Feb 28, 2010 at 10:47 PM, David Betz wrote: > I have a friend who has a Sanyo MBC-1000 and a Macintosh IIfx with both a > two page monochrome monitor (nicknamed the "Kong") and a 13" color monitor > that he'd like to pass on to someone who will appreciate them. The catch is > that they are in the San Francisco Bay Area and would need to be picked up > within the next few days. I am in the area right now and could help with the > pickup but I am leaving the Bay Area on Friday. If anyone is interested in > one or both of these machines, please contact me off list. > > His description of the Sanyo is: > > "Sanyo MBC-1000. I've got manuals and software, including Aztec-C and BIOS > source. The computer itself is very solid and was in perfect working > condition when I last used it." > > If I don't find someone to pick up these machines in the next few days they > will likely go to a recycler. > I'd be very interested in the guts of the IIfx, particularly the hard drive, memory, nubus cards, that black scsi terminator, and floppy drives. Could you possibly pick those up and bring them back/mail them if no one else wants the whole machine? brian From trebor77 at execpc.com Mon Mar 1 08:50:36 2010 From: trebor77 at execpc.com (Robert J. Stevens) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 08:50:36 -0600 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic Message-ID: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> I have a S-100 N* Horizon that I have been trying to get to run for years. Is there anyone out there running one or have one or Interested in one. I also have a bunch of S-100 Vector Graphic Cards, CPU, Memory, I/O Cards but no FDC's I am looking for any S-100 Serial I/O cards that I might be able to just in a Test Computer setup so I can test some of the Cards I have. Also Floppy disk controllers for the S-100 Buss. TIA Bob in Wisconsin From thypope at gmail.com Mon Mar 1 09:04:44 2010 From: thypope at gmail.com (Alexandru Lovin) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 17:04:44 +0200 Subject: Museums In-Reply-To: <4B60C0DB.5090302@verizon.net> References: <4B5C8E55.3050105@cimmeri.com> <4B5D155E.1050005@verizon.net> <4B5D1D50.8020902@oldskool.org> <4B60C0DB.5090302@verizon.net> Message-ID: More specifically, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.kkrieger Play that one. On Thu, Jan 28, 2010 at 12:40 AM, Keith wrote: > Forgive the dated reply. > > > Jim Leonard wrote: > >> On 1/24/2010 9:51 PM, Keith M wrote: >> >>> We were different, and we were better. And we had personality. >>> >> >> You can find personality in almost any computer subculture if you look >> hard enough. I've been involved with the "demoscene" since 1990 and no >> matter what platform a demo is written on, there's a lot of personality. >> > > Very cool. I've always liked the Amiga demos and was amazed with the things > that they could do. I would get these foreign demos and read about these > crazy copy parties/demo parties in Europe and always wondered what going to > one would be like. > > > Are there groups of young people today that find themselves emotionally >>> attached to the computers of today? >>> >> >> Yes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demoscene >> > > Very cool. I guess I didn't know that there were still people involved in > creating demos. > > Thanks for your post. > > Keith > From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Mar 1 09:33:43 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 09:33:43 -0600 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> Message-ID: <4B8BDE57.6000901@gmail.com> Robert J. Stevens wrote: > I have a S-100 N* Horizon that I have been trying to get to run for years. > Is there anyone out there running one or have one or Interested in one. > I also have a bunch of S-100 Vector Graphic Cards, CPU, Memory, I/O > Cards but no FDC's Personally, I'd love an S-100 machine (N* or otherwise) - I think they're at about that 'sweet spot' for me where they count as a useful machine, aren't too complex to completely understand, and allow for a lot of homebrewed add-ons and boards. (I'm a bit of a graphics nut, though, so I wouldn't want one unless it had some kind of graphics framebuffer in it; from purely a software point of view I've kind of had my fill of CP/M crates and text-mode terminals :-) I've helped rescue and move more S-100 machines than I care to think about, but I've never had the chance to own one myself. Maybe one day... cheers Jules From dave09 at dunfield.com Mon Mar 1 09:51:20 2010 From: dave09 at dunfield.com (Dave Dunfield) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 10:51:20 -0500 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> Message-ID: <659090783400@dunfield.com> > I have a S-100 N* Horizon that I have been trying to get to run for years. > Is there anyone out there running one or have one or Interested in one. > I also have a bunch of S-100 Vector Graphic Cards, CPU, Memory, I/O > Cards but no FDC's > I am looking for any S-100 Serial I/O cards that I might be able to just > in a Test Computer setup so I can test some of the Cards I have. > Also Floppy disk controllers for the S-100 Buss. > TIA > Bob in Wisconsin Hi Bob, You and I have corresponded before, and I believe regarding your Horizon. I would certainly count any S-100 system as Classic, and the N*Horizon is one of the biggies IMHO. I do have a Horizon running with the Double- Density N* controller, and one my my Altair's is running with the Single- Density N* controller. It's not clear from your message ... is your Horizon complete? (at least CPU, Memory and FDC), or does "No FDC's" apply to the Horizon as well? I assume it does have the standard Horizon mainboard which also includes a couple of serial ports. The Horizon can be a bit difficult to get up and running from a non- functional state, because it does not have a front panel. If you have a N* CPU board, you do at least have a 1K ROM socket (2708 or something newer adapted to a 2708 read pinout). Do you have the capability to program EPROMs? If so, I can give you a little (~500 byte) monitor that will run from the Horizon CPU ROM socket and does not need ANY RAM. This gives you a "window" into the system and lets you check out the RAM, disk controller registers etc. and makes it *MUCH* easier to bring the system up. Even if it doesn't run at first, it sits in a tight loop polling the UART - you can capture the first few bus cycles with a scope to see if it's getting there, and once you have the loop running, the repeating select for the UART makes it pretty easy to debug that. A little more info on exactly the condition and and debugging progress on your system would be helpful. Dave -- dave09 (at) Dave Dunfield dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com com Classic Computers: http://www.classiccmp.org/dunfield/ From wh.sudbrink at verizon.net Mon Mar 1 12:03:11 2010 From: wh.sudbrink at verizon.net (Bill Sudbrink) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 13:03:11 -0500 Subject: Exidy Sorcerer II schematics? Message-ID: Next up on my workbench is a Sorcerer II. I've googled about some and have found the original Sorcerer schematics. I've also found plenty of references to and pictures of the Sorcerer II board but no schematics. I got the machine from Europe so I suspect it may be hacked for 220V 50Hz. The power cord is cut off so I don't know for sure but there is definite evidence of hand soldering on the PS. Any help greatly appreciated, Bill From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 1 13:29:05 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 19:29:05 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Commodore 1520 Plotter In-Reply-To: <20100228161947.Y59773@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Feb 28, 10 04:25:40 pm Message-ID: > > Have you tried injecting more ink into one? > > Howzbout cutting down a regular ballpoint refill, and sealing the cut end? These pens have an integral; metal body which has to be the right size to fit into the carraige mechansim of the plotter. 4 pens fit into a thing a bit like the chambers of a revolver (as in the pistol) and the pen-down mechanism presses on the back end of each pen. So the diameter and length matter. I haev pletny of dead ones here (I never throw anything like that away...). Sometime I will dismantle a few (the first ones probably destrctively until I can see what bits I need to save, etc) and see if it's possble to refill them or use them to make holders for other cut-donw pens. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 1 13:41:43 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 19:41:43 +0000 (GMT) Subject: OT: white LEDs In-Reply-To: <4B8B4BAE.1@tx.rr.com> from "CSquared" at Feb 28, 10 11:07:58 pm Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > >> On Fri, Feb 26, 2010 at 2:26 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > >>> Ah, TV sets over here rarely had power transformers at all... Every valved > >>> monochrome TV Iv'e worked on... had a 300mA series string of valve heaters > >>> and got the B+ line by half-wave rectifying the mains. > >> Sure, but your mains were twice the voltage of our mains. > > > > I am suprised that voltage doubler PSUs (2 diodes, 2 capacitors) weren't > > used in the States. > > > > -tony > > > Doublers often were used in transformerless sets in the US, perhaps > almost always. ISTR seleniums with a gradual migration to solid state Right. I am not suprised. I have never seen the service manual or scheamtic for a valved US TV set. Unlike radio sets (the AM broadcast band is pretty much the same in the US and Europe, and if oyu want to recieve the European 'long wave' band, it's a simple modification), the differnce in TV standards meant that almost no US TVs ended up over here. Wit hradios, the difference in mains voltage was often handled by an aditional dropping resistor. This was commonly something called a 'line cord' which was a piece of 2 core cable with one wire being resistance wire (!). Needless to say shortening this (which some owners did for neatness) was a bad idea... This line cord also ran hot, if left coiled up it was afavourite plae for cats to sleep :-) > diodes as they became available in the needed voltage ratings. At the > moment, I can't recall having seen vacuum tube diodes used in a TV Mopstof the UK monochrome vavled TVs I've worked on ued either a selenium ('metal' ) rectivfier or a silicon diode (BY127 or similar). There were valve rectifiers (PY31, PY82), but they are much less common. Of course our sets just used a simple half-wave rectifier from the 240V or so mains. > doubler, though I imagine there were instances of that. I still have a > little 14" B&W Motorola in the garage (with a bad CRT) that might not > have the doubler. If I ever find it again or the Sams for it I'll have > to check and see. Please keep in mind that I'm speaking from my > memories of TV repair in about the 1956 to 1960 area. Once I completed > college in 1960 my path led me to devices mostly containing those > mysterious devices with no filaments. :-) And now we have TVs with no filaments at all. LCD panels with CCFL backlightes or plasma panes. I am not looking forward to having to repair one of those things. BGA chips, etc. and yes, according to the service manual foe the set we hae, you do do component-levle repair... -tony From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Mar 1 13:52:07 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 14:52:07 -0500 Subject: Commodore 1520 Plotter In-Reply-To: References: <20100228161947.Y59773@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Mon, Mar 1, 2010 at 2:29 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > I haev pletny of dead ones here (I never throw anything like that > away...). Sometime I will dismantle a few (the first ones probably > destrctively until I can see what bits I need to save, etc) and see if > it's possble to refill them or use them to make holders for other > cut-donw pens. I have a box of dead pens, too. One thought would be to bore out the ball and see about retrofitting a felt-tip. I doubt it would be easy to inject new ink, but perhaps it might be possible. With a felt-tip, at least new ink could be introduced by wicking or under low-pressure. I never have found a source of replacement gears, though. I learned about an effort to have some custom-cut out of metal, but I was far too late to participate. -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 1 14:07:02 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 12:07:02 -0800 Subject: OT: white LEDs In-Reply-To: References: <4B8B4BAE.1@tx.rr.com> from "CSquared" at Feb 28, 10 11:07:58 pm, Message-ID: <4B8BADE6.12902.93C400@cclist.sydex.com> On 1 Mar 2010 at 19:41, Tony Duell wrote: > Wit hradios, the difference in mains voltage was often handled by an > aditional dropping resistor. This was commonly something called a > 'line cord' which was a piece of 2 core cable with one wire being > resistance wire (!). I've seen the same thing used for transformerless phonographs, but the cord was 3-wire, with the resistance wire being used to drop the filament voltage. You'd see this on "crystal" cartridge phonographs with a 3-tube setup that included a 50L6, 35Z5 and a 12-volt pre-amp tube (varied). It was a real puzzle seeing a 2-prong plug ending in 3 leads... --Chuck From oltmansg at bellsouth.net Mon Mar 1 14:23:22 2010 From: oltmansg at bellsouth.net (geoffrey oltmans) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 12:23:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: Commodore 1520 Plotter In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <347752.52446.qm@web83912.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> I could be wrong about this, but if I'm not mistaken, the pens used in the Commodore plotter are the same as those used in the Radio Shack TRS-80 PC-2 Printer/Plotter. Not sure if that makes them any easier to find though. :) ________________________________ From: Tony Duell To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Sent: Mon, March 1, 2010 1:29:05 PM Subject: Re: Commodore 1520 Plotter > > Have you tried injecting more ink into one? > > Howzbout cutting down a regular ballpoint refill, and sealing the cut end? These pens have an integral; metal body which has to be the right size to fit into the carraige mechansim of the plotter. 4 pens fit into a thing a bit like the chambers of a revolver (as in the pistol) and the pen-down mechanism presses on the back end of each pen. So the diameter and length matter. I haev pletny of dead ones here (I never throw anything like that away...). Sometime I will dismantle a few (the first ones probably destrctively until I can see what bits I need to save, etc) and see if it's possble to refill them or use them to make holders for other cut-donw pens. -tony From pete at dunnington.plus.com Mon Mar 1 14:30:56 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 20:30:56 +0000 Subject: Exidy Sorcerer II schematics? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B8C2400.1070100@dunnington.plus.com> On 01/03/2010 18:03, Bill Sudbrink wrote: > Next up on my workbench is a Sorcerer II. I've googled about some > and have found the original Sorcerer schematics. I've also found > plenty of references to and pictures of the Sorcerer II board but > no schematics. I got the machine from Europe so I suspect it may > be hacked for 220V 50Hz. The power cord is cut off so I don't know > for sure but there is definite evidence of hand soldering on the PS. The Sorcerer that I have now is a Mark I, having sold my Mark II to buy something else in 1982, but I still have the manuals for the Mark II. I thought the tech manual was online somewhere, but apparently not... so if you need any particular information, ask away. I'm not sure when I'll be able to scan the schematics; life's just a little busy at the moment! -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From wh.sudbrink at verizon.net Mon Mar 1 14:47:07 2010 From: wh.sudbrink at verizon.net (Bill Sudbrink) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 15:47:07 -0500 Subject: Exidy Sorcerer II schematics? In-Reply-To: <4B8C2400.1070100@dunnington.plus.com> Message-ID: Pete Turnbull wrote: > The Sorcerer that I have now is a Mark I, having sold my Mark II to buy > something else in 1982, but I still have the manuals for the Mark II. I > thought the tech manual was online somewhere, but apparently not... so > if you need any particular information, ask away. The original Sorcerer manual has a page explicitly devoted to 110/60 to 220/50 modifications. Mods are required for both the PS and the video circuits. If there is a similar page for the II, that would be really useful (as Thomas the Tank Engine says). > I'm not sure when I'll be able to scan the schematics; life's just a > little busy at the moment! I understand completely. Thanks! Bill From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 1 14:49:02 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 20:49:02 +0000 (GMT) Subject: OT: white LEDs In-Reply-To: <4B8BADE6.12902.93C400@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 1, 10 12:07:02 pm Message-ID: > I've seen the same thing used for transformerless phonographs, but > the cord was 3-wire, with the resistance wire being used to drop the > filament voltage. You'd see this on "crystal" cartridge phonographs Yes, tapped line cordes were not uncommon over here either. > with a 3-tube setup that included a 50L6, 35Z5 and a 12-volt pre-amp > tube (varied). It was a real puzzle seeing a 2-prong plug ending in > 3 leads... M\ny of the cheap record palyers over here used a 1 or 2 vavle circuit. The amplifier valve was something like a UCL82 (triode + output pentode), the rectifier was either a UY85 or a selenium thing. But the normal way to get the heater voltage was to tap the winding on the turntable motor, and use that as an autotransformer. We ahd some oddities in the radios too. One manufacturer half-wave rectified the mains to get the HT (B+), os a hot chassis, but used an autotransformer to run a series string of valves, not a dropping resistor. Another used a double-wound transformer (and I think a centre-tapped HT secondatry feeding a full=-wave rectifier), but the heaters wrre still in series, with a suitable secodnary winding to run that string. For the transformerless sets (often called 'AC/DC' sets over here), some manufactuers used a barretter rather than a dropping resisotr, and at least one set used a normal household light bulb for that purpose (!). Philips (IIRC) even made a transformerless valve output stage. 2 output pentodes (EL84 and UL84, the latter because of the good heater-cathode insulation IIRC) as a totem pole, with a high impedance speaker (800 ohms) from the centre tape to ground through a capactior. The speaker was the main problem, it was wound with very thin wire (one reference says 0.3 thou diameter) and it was prone to go open-circuit. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 1 14:56:13 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 20:56:13 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Commodore 1520 Plotter In-Reply-To: <347752.52446.qm@web83912.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> from "geoffrey oltmans" at Mar 1, 10 12:23:22 pm Message-ID: > > I could be wrong about this, but if I'm not mistaken, the pens used in > the Commodore plotter are the same as those used in the Radio Shack > TRS-80 PC-2 Printer/Plotter. Not sure if that makes them any easier to > find though. :) Correct. I mentioned the Sharp CE150, which is what the PC2 printer/plotter is a rebandged version of. The PC2 family was closely related to the Shapr PC1500 machine, although I think the pritner/plotter was the only unit that was simply rebandged. The machine itself had a different keyboard layout (a right pain if you wanted to use keyboard overlays), and the RS232 interface was a Sahpe CE158 RS232/centronitcs interface without he centronics buffer PCB and connector. The I/O chip was still there though. I have both the Sharp and Radio Shack version, I modified the latter by fittend an 8-bit ADC converter on a bit of prototyping board, fitting it where the Centronics buffer should have gone and interfacing it through the unused lienson the I/O chip that would have been used for the Centronics port. Anyway, it does use the same pens. As does the Radio Shack CGP115, the printer that's built into one version of the Sharp MZ700 (I think that's the number, but the manual [1] is not to hand), the Oric printer, and several others. I think at least one digital 'scope (Gould?) used the same mechanism. [1] It's a nodd manual. It starts off telling you how to plug the machine in to the mains and your TV. Then ther's an introduction to BASIC with cartoon characters. So it's not a technical manual. But then you get full schematisc (of everything, including the printer and SMPSU), an introduction to machine code, memory maps and a commentes source of the monitor ROM. Hmmm... -tony From oltmansg at bellsouth.net Mon Mar 1 15:00:05 2010 From: oltmansg at bellsouth.net (geoffrey oltmans) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 13:00:05 -0800 (PST) Subject: Commodore 1520 Plotter In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <104701.77763.qm@web83906.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> Ah yes... sorry I overlooked your mention of the PC1500. The PC-2 and 1500 are fine little machines. Had lots of fun tinkering with the PC-2 as a kid. Just wish I had the RAM expander for it. Back to your regularly scheduled plotter pen dilemma... ________________________________ From: Tony Duell To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Sent: Mon, March 1, 2010 2:56:13 PM Subject: Re: Commodore 1520 Plotter > > I could be wrong about this, but if I'm not mistaken, the pens used in > the Commodore plotter are the same as those used in the Radio Shack > TRS-80 PC-2 Printer/Plotter. Not sure if that makes them any easier to > find though. :) Correct. I mentioned the Sharp CE150, which is what the PC2 printer/plotter is a rebandged version of. The PC2 family was closely related to the Shapr PC1500 machine, although I think the pritner/plotter was the only unit that was simply rebandged. The machine itself had a different keyboard layout (a right pain if you wanted to use keyboard overlays), and the RS232 interface was a Sahpe CE158 RS232/centronitcs interface without he centronics buffer PCB and connector. The I/O chip was still there though. I have both the Sharp and Radio Shack version, I modified the latter by fittend an 8-bit ADC converter on a bit of prototyping board, fitting it where the Centronics buffer should have gone and interfacing it through the unused lienson the I/O chip that would have been used for the Centronics port. Anyway, it does use the same pens. As does the Radio Shack CGP115, the printer that's built into one version of the Sharp MZ700 (I think that's the number, but the manual [1] is not to hand), the Oric printer, and several others. I think at least one digital 'scope (Gould?) used the same mechanism. [1] It's a nodd manual. It starts off telling you how to plug the machine in to the mains and your TV. Then ther's an introduction to BASIC with cartoon characters. So it's not a technical manual. But then you get full schematisc (of everything, including the printer and SMPSU), an introduction to machine code, memory maps and a commentes source of the monitor ROM. Hmmm... -tony From dbetz at xlisper.com Mon Mar 1 15:10:26 2010 From: dbetz at xlisper.com (David Betz) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 21:10:26 +0000 Subject: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx Message-ID: <1765431405-1267477632-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-500893020-@bda412.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> These machines have been claimed. Thanks for all the interest! ------Original Message------ From: David Betz Sender: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts ReplyTo: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx Sent: Feb 28, 2010 11:47 PM I have a friend who has a Sanyo MBC-1000 and a Macintosh IIfx with both a two page monochrome monitor (nicknamed the "Kong") and a 13" color monitor that he'd like to pass on to someone who will appreciate them. The catch is that they are in the San Francisco Bay Area and would need to be picked up within the next few days. I am in the area right now and could help with the pickup but I am leaving the Bay Area on Friday. If anyone is interested in one or both of these machines, please contact me off list. His description of the Sanyo is: "Sanyo MBC-1000. I've got manuals and software, including Aztec-C and BIOS source. The computer itself is very solid and was in perfect working condition when I last used it." If I don't find someone to pick up these machines in the next few days they will likely go to a recycler. Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry From mdavidson1963 at gmail.com Mon Mar 1 15:35:21 2010 From: mdavidson1963 at gmail.com (Mark Davidson) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 13:35:21 -0800 Subject: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx In-Reply-To: <1765431405-1267477632-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-500893020-@bda412.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> References: <1765431405-1267477632-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-500893020-@bda412.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> Message-ID: Crap... I should have said "I'll take the Sanyo!" :) Mark On Mon, Mar 1, 2010 at 1:10 PM, David Betz wrote: > These machines have been claimed. Thanks for all the interest! > ------Original Message------ > From: David Betz > Sender: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > ReplyTo: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx > Sent: Feb 28, 2010 11:47 PM > > I have a friend who has a Sanyo MBC-1000 and a Macintosh IIfx with both a > two page monochrome monitor (nicknamed the "Kong") and a 13" color monitor > that he'd like to pass on to someone who will appreciate them. The catch is > that they are in the San Francisco Bay Area and would need to be picked up > within the next few days. I am in the area right now and could help with the > pickup but I am leaving the Bay Area on Friday. If anyone is interested in > one or both of these machines, please contact me off list. > > His description of the Sanyo is: > > "Sanyo MBC-1000. I've got manuals and software, including Aztec-C and BIOS > source. The computer itself is very solid and was in perfect working > condition when I last used it." > > If I don't find someone to pick up these machines in the next few days they > will likely go to a recycler. > > > > Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry From teoz at neo.rr.com Mon Mar 1 15:39:35 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 16:39:35 -0500 Subject: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx References: <1765431405-1267477632-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-500893020-@bda412.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> Message-ID: <8E0C765894DB432E9F6B8CA110EF62AA@dell8300> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mark Davidson" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 4:35 PM Subject: Re: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx > Crap... I should have said "I'll take the Sanyo!" :) > > Mark > I would have snagged the IIfx if it was close, I am on the other side of the US. The two page mono monitor would have been fun to use. From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Mon Mar 1 15:40:52 2010 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 13:40:52 -0800 (PST) Subject: OT: white LEDs In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mon, 1 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > We ahd some oddities in the radios too. One manufacturer half-wave > rectified the mains to get the HT (B+), os a hot chassis, but used an > autotransformer to run a series string of valves, not a dropping > resistor. Another used a double-wound transformer (and I think a > centre-tapped HT secondatry feeding a full=-wave rectifier), but the > heaters wrre still in series, with a suitable secodnary winding to run > that string. For the transformerless sets (often called 'AC/DC' sets over > here), some manufactuers used a barretter rather than a dropping > resisotr, and at least one set used a normal household light bulb for > that purpose (!). In the US, there was the All-American Five design that was used by nearly all manufacturers for the lower end models. The heaters were wired in series and the voltage drop added up to 121. That was close enough for 120VAC and thus the transformer could be omitted. -- 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 dbetz at xlisper.com Mon Mar 1 15:50:17 2010 From: dbetz at xlisper.com (David Betz) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 21:50:17 +0000 Subject: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx In-Reply-To: References: <1765431405-1267477632-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-500893020-@bda412.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> Message-ID: <170650857-1267480025-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-123797995-@bda412.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> I found someone to take both machines but thanks for offering. Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry -----Original Message----- From: Mark Davidson Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 13:35:21 To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx Crap... I should have said "I'll take the Sanyo!" :) Mark On Mon, Mar 1, 2010 at 1:10 PM, David Betz wrote: > These machines have been claimed. Thanks for all the interest! > ------Original Message------ > From: David Betz > Sender: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > ReplyTo: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx > Sent: Feb 28, 2010 11:47 PM > > I have a friend who has a Sanyo MBC-1000 and a Macintosh IIfx with both a > two page monochrome monitor (nicknamed the "Kong") and a 13" color monitor > that he'd like to pass on to someone who will appreciate them. The catch is > that they are in the San Francisco Bay Area and would need to be picked up > within the next few days. I am in the area right now and could help with the > pickup but I am leaving the Bay Area on Friday. If anyone is interested in > one or both of these machines, please contact me off list. > > His description of the Sanyo is: > > "Sanyo MBC-1000. I've got manuals and software, including Aztec-C and BIOS > source. The computer itself is very solid and was in perfect working > condition when I last used it." > > If I don't find someone to pick up these machines in the next few days they > will likely go to a recycler. > > > > Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry From pete at dunnington.plus.com Mon Mar 1 15:52:52 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 21:52:52 +0000 Subject: Exidy Sorcerer II schematics? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B8C3734.8000803@dunnington.plus.com> On 01/03/2010 20:47, Bill Sudbrink wrote: > The original Sorcerer manual has a page explicitly devoted to 110/60 to > 220/50 modifications. Mods are required for both the PS and the video > circuits. If there is a similar page for the II, that would be really > useful (as Thomas the Tank Engine says). The 110V / 220V mod is all you need to take care of the power; the 50/60Hz mods are purely for the video. Actually I (and many others) found the modification for 50Hz wasn't bad on a Mk.II but rather less than perfect on a Mk.I, and there are some variations. The schematics in the Sorcerer 2 Technical Manual are: Master Timing for Exidy Standard Video Sorcerer Video Interface 30 lines 64 characters Sorcerer Central Processing Unit Sorcerer Dynamic RAM Section ROM Section I/O and UART Interfaces Cassette Interface Sorcerer II Power Schematic Expansion Chassis Motherboard The Master Timing is the one you'd want in order to understand the 50/60Hz change. Logically, the Power Schematic would be the one for 110V/220V, but it doesn't actually show the transformer primary. On a Mark II, the 50/60Hz is set by one section of a DIP switch at location 11A. Section 1 of that is on for 50HZ and off for 60Hz. When on, it grounds the /SEL inputs on a pair of LS157 muxes which are part of the feedback in a set of counters made from a couple of LS161s and an LS74. The other parts of that switch control whether you have 3 rows of DRAM (on) or 2 (off), 16Kx1 RAMs or 4Kx1, and 2 rows or 1 row. From the manual: "For 110V, the power supply transformer primary windings are connected in parallel; to convert to 220V, disconnect them and wire in series. Do this by cutting the black-yellow and black-red wires at the line filter, and soldering them together." On mine, they're neatly soldered together inside some sleeving. If you look carefully at the line filter mounted to the left of the transformer, you'll see that one terminal has a black-green wire going to the transformer, and that's the one that the black-red wire should connect to for 110V. The other terminal has a plain black wire, and that's where the black-yellow wire should connect for 110V. While you have the lid off, and are looking around thre anyway, check the big filter cap next to the transformer, and a somewhat smaller (usually blue) one on the PCB near the regulator heatsinks. These are two common points of failure on these machines. Another common problem is the 0.156" Molex connector on the main board, which can get very hot and start to go high resistance. If it looks brown, clean the contacts and perhaps replace the shell. Incidentally, there's a timing problem evident with some DRAMs, and there's a modification to fix it. The symptom is that a machine with 48K of DRAM only appears to have 32K, or at worst, doesn't boot with all 48K fitted. Another thing to be aware of is the serial port problem -- the original Sorcerers had a logic mis-design that meant that the RS232 line was held in the wrong state when idling. There's a software "fix" that doesn't work nearly as well as the authors claim, but a hardware fix is fairly easy. You /don't/ need any fix on a Mk.II and trying to make one will actually stop RS232 working. Have you got any software for yours? I've got a couple of things as MP3s, one or two old tapes that I'll investigate "one day", a few binary files saved to disk (I used to "save" down the RS232 line to a tape emulator on another machine, and load back the same way), and dumps of the WP PAC ROMs. I don't have the WP PAC manual; I do have the Dev PAC manual but haven't been able to find a dump of the ROMs for it (which is annoying, as I used to write Z80 code using the Dev PAC, decades ago). -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 1 16:15:29 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:15:29 -0800 Subject: OT: white LEDs In-Reply-To: References: <4B8BADE6.12902.93C400@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 1, 10 12:07:02 pm, Message-ID: <4B8BCC01.16627.1095C9E@cclist.sydex.com> On 1 Mar 2010 at 20:49, Tony Duell wrote: > Philips (IIRC) even made a transformerless valve output stage. 2 > output pentodes (EL84 and UL84, the latter because of the good > heater-cathode insulation IIRC) as a totem pole, with a high impedance > speaker (800 ohms) from the centre tape to ground through a capactior. > The speaker was the main problem, it was wound with very thin wire > (one reference says 0.3 thou diameter) and it was prone to go > open-circuit. There were a few audiophile hobby designs that used multiple paralleled beam tubes in a cathode-follower arrangement to directly drive an 8 or 16-ohm speaker. An interesting project for a time because the WWII-surplus 1625 (7 pin 12.6v version of the 807) could be had by the caselot for very little. A friend built a grounded- grid 160m final using them, powering the series filaments directly from the line. At higher frequencies, it was a common practice to hacksaw or drill into the base and fish out the beam-forming electrodes and bring them to a spare pin for GG operation. --Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 1 16:35:36 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:35:36 -0800 Subject: CBM MPS801 available; was Commodore 1520 Plotter In-Reply-To: <347752.52446.qm@web83912.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> References: , <347752.52446.qm@web83912.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4B8BD0B8.27312.11BC9D7@cclist.sydex.com> Forgive me for tagging onto a Commodore thread, but I've got an MPS- 801 dot matrix printer that I'd like to give away for the cost of shipping from 97405. It runs the self-test just fine; I can't test anything beyond that. I've tried and failed to find a taker on Erik's VC Forum, so if it doesn't get taken by the end of the week, ?'m going to scrap it--I don't collect Commodore. Thanks, Chuck From rogpugh at mac.com Mon Mar 1 17:00:17 2010 From: rogpugh at mac.com (Roger Pugh) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 23:00:17 +0000 Subject: CBM MPS801 available; was Commodore 1520 Plotter In-Reply-To: <4B8BD0B8.27312.11BC9D7@cclist.sydex.com> References: <347752.52446.qm@web83912.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> <4B8BD0B8.27312.11BC9D7@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B8C4701.9090502@mac.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > Forgive me for tagging onto a Commodore thread, All this talk of Commodore peripherals is making me nostalgic. I will dust off the SX64 at weekend and have a play i think! I'm sure i have some of these new fiber tip printer/plotter pens i got with a tandy plotter somewhere.. i will take a photo of a fiber pen if i find one! remember "open 1,8,15" commands? Roger From tosteve at yahoo.com Mon Mar 1 18:11:40 2010 From: tosteve at yahoo.com (steven stengel) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 16:11:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: Free: 8-inch drives, S-100 expansion in OC, CA Message-ID: <183601.25176.qm@web110605.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> For your eyes only: http://popbottlecaps.com/temp/S-100.jpg http://popbottlecaps.com/temp/drives.jpg -- Two different 8-inch floppy drives, physically in great condition, operational status unknown. -- An S-100 expansion chassis Included at no additional charge: -- VersaFloppy S-100 card w/ manual -- ExpandoRAM S-100 card (0K installed) w/ manual Free for Pick-up preferred! Located in Aliso Viejo, CA 92656 From geneb at deltasoft.com Mon Mar 1 18:38:40 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 16:38:40 -0800 Subject: H325 test connector... In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003010458w3e3810d6q23cdb4145e211f10@mail.gmail.com> References: <01f101cab8fa$601f9de0$748b11ac@SCZ.ST.COM> <6dbe3c381003010458w3e3810d6q23cdb4145e211f10@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B8C5E10.60201@deltasoft.com> Free to the first good home. The "Cut to test new sync" jumper is present. What is this used for? tnx. g. From brain at jbrain.com Mon Mar 1 19:02:56 2010 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 19:02:56 -0600 Subject: Commodore 1520 Plotter In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B8C63C0.2060205@jbrain.com> I've a few of these plotters that claim they are parts units. If anyone is looking for a part, I can see if the units have the requisite part and can mail it (or them) out. Or, I can mail the entire unit if someone needs a batch of parts. Jim From wh.sudbrink at verizon.net Mon Mar 1 19:15:57 2010 From: wh.sudbrink at verizon.net (Bill Sudbrink) Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2010 20:15:57 -0500 Subject: Exidy Sorcerer II schematics? In-Reply-To: <4B8C3734.8000803@dunnington.plus.com> Message-ID: Hi Pete, Unfortunately, my machine doesn't seem to match the descriptions in your last message. The silkscreen definitely says "Sorcerer II". In terms of the power supply... There is no black/red wire on my transformer. All of the wires are on one side of the transformer (away from the filter). There are 11 wires: Solid black- NC Solid yellow - NC Black with yellow stripe - line filter (LOAD) Solid white - line filter (LOAD) Black with white stripe---\ }Connected together White with black stripe---/ Solid red 1 - Power supply board pin 1 Solid blue 1 - Power supply board pin 2 Red with yellow stripe - Power supply board pin 3 Solid blue 2 - Power supply board pin 5 Solid red 2 - Power supply board pin 6 All of the electrolytics on the power supply board are bulging. There has been some hand soldering (rather poorly done) around the diodes. The Molex pins between the power supply board and the logic board are clean and bright. There is a DIP switch at A-11. It has four switches. The silkscreen seems to indicate that all four switches control the RAM geometry, but it could be wrong. Reads (among others): SW1 ON - 3 ROWS 16K SW1 OFF - 3 ROWS 4K All switches are on. All RAM banks are populated with MK4215N-2. In addition, there are a number of cuts and jumper wires in the video generation section: A16 pin 4 - B17 pin 2 B17 pin 4 - A19 pin 1 Pads at B19: E4-E5 cut E2-E3 cut E2 jumpered to E1 E4 jumpered one pad down (can't read silkscreen) In terms of software, I have an 8-track BASIC ROM pack. Otherwise, nothing. Thanks, Bill From alhartman at yahoo.com Mon Mar 1 21:18:50 2010 From: alhartman at yahoo.com (Al Hartman) Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 19:18:50 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bootable Model III disks... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <436725.21539.qm@web55304.mail.re4.yahoo.com> C'mon guys... Nobody with a Model I and E/I with disk drives left it stock without a doubler of some kind... and... If you had the LNDoubler, you could do 8" and 5.25" (and now 3.5") single and double density disks all with the same board. I don't know of any board that only added 8" without adding a Doubler as well. I'm not saying there wasn't one... I just don't know about it. Percom, Tandy, LNW and Aerocomp made doublers. I think only the latter two supported 8" drives. Any Model I equipped with a doubler should be able to copy a Model III bootable diskette. Al Keansburg, NJ From rodsmallwood at btconnect.com Tue Mar 2 00:47:01 2010 From: rodsmallwood at btconnect.com (Rod Smallwood) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 06:47:01 -0000 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <4B8BDE57.6000901@gmail.com> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> <4B8BDE57.6000901@gmail.com> Message-ID: <0C14E2A0ECD54044A1963F160F1064C1@RodsDevSystem> I have some of a Horizon to wit the mother board. I cleaned it up when I got it and will sort out a power supply shortly. I'm on the look out for S100 boards to go with it. Why the Horizon? I wrote commercial software on it in CBasic using Wordstar as an editor when the machine was current. ? Rod Smallwood ? ? -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Jules Richardson Sent: 01 March 2010 15:34 To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic Robert J. Stevens wrote: > I have a S-100 N* Horizon that I have been trying to get to run for years. > Is there anyone out there running one or have one or Interested in one. > I also have a bunch of S-100 Vector Graphic Cards, CPU, Memory, I/O > Cards but no FDC's Personally, I'd love an S-100 machine (N* or otherwise) - I think they're at about that 'sweet spot' for me where they count as a useful machine, aren't too complex to completely understand, and allow for a lot of homebrewed add-ons and boards. (I'm a bit of a graphics nut, though, so I wouldn't want one unless it had some kind of graphics framebuffer in it; from purely a software point of view I've kind of had my fill of CP/M crates and text-mode terminals :-) I've helped rescue and move more S-100 machines than I care to think about, but I've never had the chance to own one myself. Maybe one day... cheers Jules From steve at cosam.org Tue Mar 2 02:53:34 2010 From: steve at cosam.org (Steve Maddison) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 09:53:34 +0100 Subject: H325 test connector... In-Reply-To: <4B8C5E10.60201@deltasoft.com> References: <01f101cab8fa$601f9de0$748b11ac@SCZ.ST.COM> <6dbe3c381003010458w3e3810d6q23cdb4145e211f10@mail.gmail.com> <4B8C5E10.60201@deltasoft.com> Message-ID: Gene Buckle wrote: > What is this used for? The H325 is an RS-232 loopback connector, typically used for diagnostics. The jumper connects a few modem control lines to each other so that you can configure whether these signals are looped back or not. Cheers, -- Steve Maddison http://www.cosam.org/ From ajp166 at verizon.net Tue Mar 2 08:09:32 2010 From: ajp166 at verizon.net (Allison) Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2010 09:09:32 -0500 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <4B8BDE57.6000901@gmail.com> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> <4B8BDE57.6000901@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B8D1C1C.3010302@verizon.net> Jules Richardson wrote: > Robert J. Stevens wrote: >> I have a S-100 N* Horizon that I have been trying to get to run for >> years. >> Is there anyone out there running one or have one or Interested in one. >> I also have a bunch of S-100 Vector Graphic Cards, CPU, Memory, I/O >> Cards but no FDC's > > Personally, I'd love an S-100 machine (N* or otherwise) - I think > they're at about that 'sweet spot' for me where they count as a useful > machine, aren't too complex to completely understand, and allow for a > lot of homebrewed add-ons and boards. (I'm a bit of a graphics nut, > though, so I wouldn't want one unless it had some kind of graphics > framebuffer in it; from purely a software point of view I've kind of > had my fill of CP/M crates and text-mode terminals :-) > > I've helped rescue and move more S-100 machines than I care to think > about, but I've never had the chance to own one myself. Maybe one day... > > cheers > > Jules > > The NS* is clearly a classic S100. It was introduced in 1978 a while after the MDS and the CPU boards. Being a non front panel machine has always made it tricky for those of minimum resources. I know as I have two of them operational plus spare boards enough to make another two. Once working they tend to be very dependable. I know that as I still have the one that I assembled in 1978 and still use! The debug process is far simplified if there is either a known working machine to test all the pieces with or a CPU boarfd with onboard monitor rom (and known operational). once you can talk to it most problems are easily diagnosed to the board level. Common problems seen.. Bad sockets, some of the side wipe sockets used in the kits were bluntly crap and fail with age or insert removel cycles of the chips. Boards with blown bus IO from insertion or removal with DC on the bus or not waiting for the power supply caps to discharge. Bad disk drives and or bad /wrong media. Occasional efforts to boot working systems with IO area customized for another IO (usually the serial ports). And misconfiguration of the various jumpers on boards. That includes CPU, Disk, Ram, and bus IO area. Also at least one case of everything OK but the terminal IO at the terminal end bad never minding wrong cable (incorrect CTS and DIN and DOU reversed). I've worked on more than a few and all only took a few hours to fully debug and fix or in some cases replace really messed up boards. Allison From geneb at deltasoft.com Tue Mar 2 08:45:49 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 06:45:49 -0800 (PST) Subject: H325 test connector... In-Reply-To: References: <01f101cab8fa$601f9de0$748b11ac@SCZ.ST.COM> <6dbe3c381003010458w3e3810d6q23cdb4145e211f10@mail.gmail.com> <4B8C5E10.60201@deltasoft.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 2 Mar 2010, Steve Maddison wrote: > Gene Buckle wrote: >> What is this used for? > > The H325 is an RS-232 loopback connector, typically used for > diagnostics. The jumper connects a few modem control lines to each > other so that you can configure whether these signals are looped back > or not. > Thanks Steve. g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Tue Mar 2 13:42:59 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 20:42:59 +0100 Subject: HP 9825 tape drive Message-ID: <806BB249B7D84B3EB47DFBB1794AC9D1@xp1800> I modified a HP 9825A tape drive for use with QIC 40/80 tapes. It's a rather easy conversion building a new capstand wheel witch is a little higher so it can drive the QIC tapes and increasing the write current by replacing a the current limiter resistor. It's under test and at the moment seems to work. I was curious if there others who did the same and what theire experiances are... -Rik From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 2 13:55:37 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 11:55:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: User community subsets (Was: Bootable Model III disks... In-Reply-To: <436725.21539.qm@web55304.mail.re4.yahoo.com> References: <436725.21539.qm@web55304.mail.re4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20100302110730.A35252@shell.lmi.net> On Mon, 1 Mar 2010, Al Hartman wrote: > C'mon guys... Nobody with a Model I and E/I with disk drives left it > stock without a doubler of some kind... not stock, but the add-ons were mutually incompatible. Sorry, but I must take issue with being a "Nobody". Not contesting the veracity of it, just taking issue with being a Nobody. If you compare the number of machines sold, with the number of accessories sold, there were a surprising number (in closets?) of machines without add-ons, owned by NOBODY's > and... If you had the LNDoubler, you could do 8" and 5.25" (and now > 3.5") single and double density disks all with the same board. > I don't know of any board that only added 8" without adding a Doubler as > well. I'm not saying there wasn't one... I just don't know about it. The Omicron 8" board AND the Parasitic Engineering (Howard Fullmer) did 8" SSSD, but did NOT add MFM. They used 1771s. At the time, "doublers" were not available commercially yet, although the Percom Data Separator was becoming quite popular. The Omicron CP/M board would only work with the Omicron 8" board, NO OTHER 8" boards. It even had an additional pigtail connecting the CPU and FDC sandwich boards. If the Parasitic Engineering board would work with other 8" boards, I never found a way to make it work, although admittedly, I never disassembled its boot code to look for port accesses, or other software switches. > Percom, Tandy, LNW and Aerocomp made doublers. I think only the latter > two supported 8" drives. Yes, MUCH LATER, Tandy, LNW, Aerocomp? got into it. There were YEARS when Percom was the only choice, and by the time the others got into it, most of us had switched over to 5150, etc. "EVERYBODY had . . . " was a common refrain. But, it usually only referred to a limited local subset of the community. Community subsets were extremely common, and many/most microcomputer users were only in touch with others with the same basic configuration they had. But, since EVERYBODY did that, NOBODY acknowledged the existence of OTHER user community subsets. "EVERYBODY has after-market mods." "EVERYBODY buys the machine fully expanded - it's cheaper that way." "EVERYBODY buys the machine bare and expands it - it's cheaper that way." "EVERYBODY uses the RS monitor on their Model 1." "EVERYBODY has a clock calendar card. (5150)" "EVERYBODY has a SCSI card." "EVERYBODY uses ANSI.SYS." "EVERYBODY has a SCSI card." "EVERYBODY buys generic XT motherboards" "EVERYBODY buys their generic XT motherboards bare and populates them" "EVERYBODY uses a V20 for DOUBLE the speed." "EVERYBODY runs their AT with a faster crystal. (Until IBM altered the boot code)" "EVERYBODY has 640K on their motherboard." "EVERYBODY uses JFORMAT." "EVERYBODY converts their Gavilan to DS." "EVERYBODY has voice output." "EVERYBODY has added a control key." "EVERYBODY has replaced their model 1s with model 3s." "EVERYBODY has model 4s, instead of model 3s." "EVERYBODY who does graphics uses a Mac." "EVERYBODY who uses VisiCalc uses an Apple ][." "EVERYBODY has a ZIF socket for their joysticks (Apple ][)" "EVERYBODY has joysticks, instead of game paddles." "EVERYBODY has a Z80 card." "EVERYBODY uses parallel printers, not serial." "EVERYBODY uses 1200 baud." "EVERYBODY rolls their own BIOS" "NOBODY uses assembly language any more, nor ever will again" - Clancy & Harvey . . . Which of those were true for YOUR circle of friends? Which other ones did I leave off? Aren't some of those pretty stupid? (Don't you hate rhetorical questions?) > Any Model I equipped with a doubler should be able to copy a Model III > bootable diskette. True Although I had half a dozen Percom Doublers, THREE of my 4 model 1s did not have doublers in them for more than a few weeks each, before changing to other mutually incompatible sandwiches. Each one was also tested STOCK before modification (well, at least booted once) For TRS80 MFM, I mostly used model 3s. BTW, one of the colleges had all of their model 3s CONVERTED to model 4s. The price for conversion was ~$100 more than a new bare model 4. "EVERYBODY has the conversion done." From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 2 15:00:16 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2010 13:00:16 -0800 Subject: HP 9825 tape drive In-Reply-To: <806BB249B7D84B3EB47DFBB1794AC9D1@xp1800> References: <806BB249B7D84B3EB47DFBB1794AC9D1@xp1800> Message-ID: <4B8D0BE0.27207.1116BE9@cclist.sydex.com> On 2 Mar 2010 at 20:42, Rik Bos wrote: > I modified a HP 9825A tape drive for use with QIC 40/80 tapes. > It's a rather easy conversion building a new capstand wheel witch is a > little higher so it can drive the QIC tapes and increasing the write > current by replacing a the current limiter resistor. It's under test > and at the moment seems to work. I was curious if there others who did > the same and what theire experiances are... Interesting, Rik. What did you use to build the new capstan? --Chuck From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 2 15:07:14 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 13:07:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <0C14E2A0ECD54044A1963F160F1064C1@RodsDevSystem> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> <4B8BDE57.6000901@gmail.com> <0C14E2A0ECD54044A1963F160F1064C1@RodsDevSystem> Message-ID: <20100302130454.X35252@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 2 Mar 2010, Rod Smallwood wrote: > Why the Horizon? I wrote commercial software on it in CBasic using Wordstar > as an editor when the machine was current. CBASIC and Wordstar were both VERY portable. Just about any CP/M machine would satisfy THAT part of the nostalgia. Is it still possible to get plywood of the right thickness to duplicate the top of the Horizon? From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Mar 2 15:09:46 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 16:09:46 -0500 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <20100302130454.X35252@shell.lmi.net> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> <4B8BDE57.6000901@gmail.com> <0C14E2A0ECD54044A1963F160F1064C1@RodsDevSystem> <20100302130454.X35252@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Tue, Mar 2, 2010 at 4:07 PM, Fred Cisin wrote: > Is it still possible to get plywood of the right thickness to duplicate > the top of the Horizon? I don't know that I've seen a Horizon since 1980 - what was unusual about the wood? Too thin to support a terminal without sagging? -ethan From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 2 15:21:24 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 13:21:24 -0800 (PST) Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> <4B8BDE57.6000901@gmail.com> <0C14E2A0ECD54044A1963F160F1064C1@RodsDevSystem> <20100302130454.X35252@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20100302131552.A35252@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 2 Mar 2010, Ethan Dicks wrote: > I don't know that I've seen a Horizon since 1980 - what was unusual > about the wood? Too thin to support a terminal without sagging? plenty strong enough Regular Oak? plywood. Probably from Ashby Lumber. BUT, . . . when I go to buy 3/4" plywood these days, it is no longer 3/4"! Somewhere in my storage, I have two of the three pieces of a Horizon lid; I might have to plane, or special order, just to get a piece to cut to replace the missing one! I'll wait until I run across it again, since I don't even remember for sure what finish and size it was. From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Tue Mar 2 15:30:26 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 22:30:26 +0100 Subject: HP 9825 tape drive In-Reply-To: <4B8D0BE0.27207.1116BE9@cclist.sydex.com> References: <806BB249B7D84B3EB47DFBB1794AC9D1@xp1800> <4B8D0BE0.27207.1116BE9@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Chuck Guzis > Verzonden: dinsdag 2 maart 2010 22:00 > Aan: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Onderwerp: Re: HP 9825 tape drive > > On 2 Mar 2010 at 20:42, Rik Bos wrote: > > > I modified a HP 9825A tape drive for use with QIC 40/80 tapes. > > It's a rather easy conversion building a new capstand wheel > witch is a > > little higher so it can drive the QIC tapes and increasing > the write > > current by replacing a the current limiter resistor. It's > under test > > and at the moment seems to work. I was curious if there > others who did > > the same and what theire experiances are... > > Interesting, Rik. What did you use to build the new capstan? > > --Chuck > For the prototype I glued a small clilinder of polycabonate on top of the capstand. I used a poly-urethane glue for it. After customizing the capstand I fitted a small piece of rubber hose on it (I use 6.5 mm hydraulic hose for Citroen LHM systems also glued with poly-urethane glue ) the next step is grinding the capstand to the right size on a small lathe. I'll put some pictures on flickr this week. -Rik From pete at dunnington.plus.com Tue Mar 2 15:28:10 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2010 21:28:10 +0000 Subject: Exidy Sorcerer II schematics? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B8D82EA.5040902@dunnington.plus.com> On 02/03/2010 01:15, Bill Sudbrink wrote: > Unfortunately, my machine doesn't seem to match the descriptions > in your last message. The silkscreen definitely says "Sorcerer II". The things I described should match; they're from the Sorcerer 2 Technical Manual and a bit of my memory. > In terms of the power supply... There is no black/red wire > on my transformer. All of the wires are on one side of the > transformer (away from the filter). There are 11 wires: > > Solid black- NC > Solid yellow - NC > > Black with yellow stripe - line filter (LOAD) > Solid white - line filter (LOAD) > > Black with white stripe---\ > }Connected together > White with black stripe---/ The rest are the secondaries. I'm not sure about the solid yellow and solid black, but I'd guess they are taps for slightly different supply voltages (eg 110/120 or 220/240), and the rest is pretty much as the technical manualk describes: two primaries, to be wired in series for 220/240V and in parallel for 110/120V. I reckon you should split the black/white and white/black, and look carefully at the black/yellow and solid white connections on the filter. You might be able to see where the black/white and white/black once were, if it started life as a 110V machine. If not, you should find by doing a continuity test that the black/white is one end of the primary that has either the solid white or black/yellow at the other end, and therefore should go to the opposite side of the filter output. Similarly for the white/black wire. > All of the electrolytics on the power supply board are > bulging. I'd replace those, in that case. > There is a DIP switch at A-11. It has four switches. The > silkscreen seems to indicate that all four switches control > the RAM geometry, but it could be wrong. Reads (among others): > > SW1 ON - 3 ROWS 16K > SW1 OFF - 3 ROWS 4K > > All switches are on. All RAM banks are populated with MK4215N-2. All "on" should mean 50Hz (section 1 of the switch) and 3 rows of 18K DRAMs, so you have a 48K machine. > In addition, there are a number of cuts and jumper wires in > the video generation section: > > A16 pin 4 - B17 pin 2 > B17 pin 4 - A19 pin 1 Those certainly part of the video sync timing. > Pads at B19: > > E4-E5 cut > E2-E3 cut > E2 jumpered to E1 > E4 jumpered one pad down (can't read silkscreen) Isn't there a 74LS157 at B19? The pads might be timing, but they might also be part of the ROM decoding, or used to allow signals and power to be re-routed according to the use of 3-rail EPROMs, single-rail EPROMs, or mask ROMs for the monitor. My Sorcerer 2 schematics only show the latter, and not at B19. Are your monitor and chargen ROMs mask ROMs or EPROMs? Unless anyone else with a Sorcer 2 can identify those, you might need to see what IC pins those connect to so we can work it out. Or just reverse the mods and see what happens. I'd sort out the 110V power first, though. Incidentally, the schematics for the original Sorcerer and the Sorcerer 2 are very similar, except for the IC positions. It's worth downloading the Tech Manual. At least you'll see how the PSU and transformer are arranged. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 2 15:43:14 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2010 13:43:14 -0800 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <20100302131552.A35252@shell.lmi.net> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com>, , <20100302131552.A35252@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4B8D15F2.17068.138C219@cclist.sydex.com> On 2 Mar 2010 at 13:21, Fred Cisin wrote: > BUT, . . . > when I go to buy 3/4" plywood these days, it is no longer 3/4"! Take the standard stuff and stick a layer of veneer to it. (All sorts of veneer is available for kitchen cabinet refacing and has its own adhesive backing. Usually 1/32" thick. There ya go. --Chuck From ajp166 at verizon.net Tue Mar 2 16:21:15 2010 From: ajp166 at verizon.net (allison) Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2010 17:21:15 -0500 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <20100302131552.A35252@shell.lmi.net> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> <4B8BDE57.6000901@gmail.com> <0C14E2A0ECD54044A1963F160F1064C1@RodsDevSystem> <20100302130454.X35252@shell.lmi.net> <20100302131552.A35252@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4B8D8F5B.5000700@verizon.net> Fred Cisin wrote: > On Tue, 2 Mar 2010, Ethan Dicks wrote: > >> I don't know that I've seen a Horizon since 1980 - what was unusual >> about the wood? Too thin to support a terminal without sagging? >> > > plenty strong enough > Regular Oak? plywood. Probably from Ashby Lumber. > > > BUT, . . . > when I go to buy 3/4" plywood these days, it is no longer 3/4"! > > Somewhere in my storage, I have two of the three pieces of a Horizon lid; > I might have to plane, or special order, just to get a piece to cut to > replace the missing one! I'll wait until I run across it again, since I > don't even remember for sure what finish and size it was. > > Plain oak ply 3/4" thick. Mine is dark finish mahogany or thereabouts. Allison From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 2 15:59:15 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 21:59:15 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP 9825 tape drive In-Reply-To: <806BB249B7D84B3EB47DFBB1794AC9D1@xp1800> from "Rik Bos" at Mar 2, 10 08:42:59 pm Message-ID: > I modified a HP 9825A tape drive for use with QIC 40/80 tapes. > It's a rather easy conversion building a new capstand wheel witch is a > little higher so it can drive the QIC tapes and increasing the write current > by replacing a the current limiter resistor. > It's under test and at the moment seems to work. > I was curious if there others who did the same and what theire experiances > are... I've never tried any such modifications, but if you can poit me at details I might well give them a go. I wonder if the HP9815 can be modified the same way (it's the save drive and head switch/amplifier PCB, buit with a totally different controller). -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 2 16:25:59 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 22:25:59 +0000 (GMT) Subject: User community subsets (Was: Bootable Model III disks... In-Reply-To: <20100302110730.A35252@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Mar 2, 10 11:55:37 am Message-ID: > > On Mon, 1 Mar 2010, Al Hartman wrote: > > C'mon guys... Nobody with a Model I and E/I with disk drives left it > > stock without a doubler of some kind... > > not stock, but the add-ons were mutually incompatible. > Sorry, but I must take issue with being a "Nobody". Oh, I don;'t maind. I am used to being a 'nobody'... > "EVERYBODY had . . . " was a common refrain. But, it usually only > referred to a limited local subset of the community. > Community subsets were extremely common, and many/most microcomputer users > were only in touch with others with the same basic configuration they had. > But, since EVERYBODY did that, NOBODY acknowledged the existence of OTHER > user community subsets. > > > "EVERYBODY has after-market mods." OK, i do, on many of my machines, but not all... > "EVERYBODY buys the machine fully expanded - it's cheaper that way." No way! > "EVERYBODY buys the machine bare and expands it - it's cheaper that way." Yes, but not because it's cheaper, but becasue I cna get exactly the stuff I want... > "EVERYBODY uses the RS monitor on their Model 1." I do. But I als use the M1 montiro as a composite monitor (beleive-it-or-not it could manage MDA scan rates...) I have the European model, of course, with an isolating transformer whcih means it doens't need 5V fro mthe video source. > "EVERYBODY has a clock calendar card. (5150)" Plety of my 5150s and 5160s don't... > "EVERYBODY has a SCSI card." Hmmm.... > "EVERYBODY uses ANSI.SYS." No I don't.. > "EVERYBODY has a SCSI card." Haven't we just had that one > "EVERYBODY buys generic XT motherboards" As you well know, I insisted on IBM motherboards becuase I have the scheamtics for them... > "EVERYBODY buys their generic XT motherboards bare and populates them" Only if I can get them truely bare and get to solder in every last IC and resistor... > "EVERYBODY uses a V20 for DOUBLE the speed." I don't think I own a V20... > "EVERYBODY runs their AT with a faster crystal. (Until IBM altered the > boot code)" Mine is the faser IBM one... > "EVERYBODY has 640K on their motherboard." Not in the AT (it maxes out tat 512K). Of course I hacked the 5160 (and 5155) boards to take 640K. > "EVERYBODY uses JFORMAT." Never heard of it... > "EVERYBODY converts their Gavilan to DS." Not a machine I've come across in the flesh... > "EVERYBODY has voice output." Oh yes, _I_ can speak. I am not sauying anything about my machines... > "EVERYBODY has added a control key." Not on my ASR33... > "EVERYBODY has replaced their model 1s with model 3s." > "EVERYBODY has model 4s, instead of model 3s." > "EVERYBODY who does graphics uses a Mac." PERQ, PDP11, HP9000... > "EVERYBODY who uses VisiCalc uses an Apple ][." Nope, I run it on an HP75C (seriously) > "EVERYBODY has a ZIF socket for their joysticks (Apple ][)" Alas not. > "EVERYBODY has joysticks, instead of game paddles." Does a bitstick count? > "EVERYBODY has a Z80 card." In what machine? (I suspect you're thinking of the Apple ][, but it was also a problem on S100 machines (some CP/M software neeeded a Z80 and wouldn't run on an 8080 or 8085 CPU), and of course there were CP/M processor add-ons for many other machines) > "EVERYBODY uses parallel printers, not serial." Is that Centronics parallel or GPIB parallel? :-) > "EVERYBODY uses 1200 baud." Yes., And plenty of other baud rates from 45.45 upwards... > "EVERYBODY rolls their own BIOS" Err, yes... > "NOBODY uses assembly language any more, nor ever will again" - Clancy & > Harvey > . . . Last time I wrte assembly language was, oh, a couple of days ago... > > Which of those were true for YOUR circle of friends? > Which other ones did I leave off? "Everybody usese ASCII" "Everybody has aVAX" "Everybopdy has a PC" "Everybody has a Pentium" "Everybody runs Windows" "Everybody has a graphical display" "Everybody has a scanner" "Everybody has a digital camera" "Everybody has a USB port" "Nobody does component-level repair" [The last (n-3) of those are false for me, of course...] -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 2 15:38:23 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 21:38:23 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Exidy Sorcerer II schematics? In-Reply-To: from "Bill Sudbrink" at Mar 1, 10 08:15:57 pm Message-ID: > > Hi Pete, > > Unfortunately, my machine doesn't seem to match the descriptions > in your last message. The silkscreen definitely says "Sorcerer II". > > In terms of the power supply... There is no black/red wire > on my transformer. All of the wires are on one side of the > transformer (away from the filter). There are 11 wires: > > Solid black- NC > Solid yellow - NC > > Black with yellow stripe - line filter (LOAD) > Solid white - line filter (LOAD) > > Black with white stripe---\ > }Connected together > White with black stripe---/ My guess is that those are the primary winding connections. The 'LOAD' side of the mains filter is the output side (meaning it should be connected to the laod) and is effectively the mains supply to the transdormer. My guess (again, I've not seen this machiue) is that there are 2 primary windings each of 115V or so) and theey'r currenyl conencted in series fro 230V (or so) mains. Whether the totally unconnected wires are also taps on the primary windigns (it wasn't uncommon to have 0-100-120V windings so you could wire them up for 100V, 120V, 220V or 240V mains) I don't know, but it probably doesn't matter. What you need to do is to open that connection between the Black/White and White/Black wires. Then test the ends of these wires to the loadf terminals of the line filter (do each wire separately, and leave the 2 transformer wires connected to the line filter). You should find that each fo the 2 'free' wires tests with a low resistane to one terminal and infinite resistance to the other one. Then connect each of the 'free' wires to the terminal it tested as infinite resistance to (if you work out what's going on, you'll see this connects the 2 primary windings in parallel, with the correct pahising) Then test the supply on dummy load! -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 2 15:14:00 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 21:14:00 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Commodore 1520 Plotter In-Reply-To: <104701.77763.qm@web83906.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> from "geoffrey oltmans" at Mar 1, 10 01:00:05 pm Message-ID: > > Ah yes... sorry I overlooked your mention of the PC1500. The PC-2 and > 1500 are fine little machines. Had lots of fun tinkering with the PC-2 > as a kid. Just wish I had the RAM expander for it. I have one too, and as you may have guessed, I hacked it a bit. I bought the Technical manual from Sharp (mise is a PC1500 rather than a PC2), which geve ,me schematics, the instruction set, and useful ROM calls. It has a nice standard-ish expansion bus (16 parallel address lines, 8 parallel data lines, etc), so homebrew hardware hacks are certainly possible. > > Back to your regularly scheduled plotter pen dilemma... I bolted a board to the bottom of my CE150 (and covered it with a custom-made plastic case) containng some 6364 RAM chips. I think I mapped 16K into the 'normal' address sapce for program and data storage and 8K into the secondtay space (accessible by PEEK# and POKE# IIRC) which can only be used for data. The HP71B is a much nicer machine, but a lot more expensive back then, and the techncial docs were out of this world (I think a comp[lete IDS cost more than the machine!). Of course the HP documentation was excellent and included full commented ROM source, but... (I now have it, BTW...). And the HP71 bus is nothing short of strange... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 2 15:42:16 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 21:42:16 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Bootable Model III disks... In-Reply-To: <436725.21539.qm@web55304.mail.re4.yahoo.com> from "Al Hartman" at Mar 1, 10 07:18:50 pm Message-ID: > > > C'mon guys... Nobody with a Model I and E/I with disk drives left it > stock without a doubler of some kind... I did (and still do). I nver even upgraded the data seperator (I had no trouble _at all_ wiotjh the internal separator of the 1771!). I was going to upgrade to a double-density controller. It was long after these had been discontinued, but I ordered (and still have) the service manual for the Radio Shack doubler. I also consddered makign a M1 that behaved like an M3, I hacked 48K onto the mainboard of a 'spare' M1, and got M3 BASIC sort-of running on it. I intended to wire-wrap the extra cassette interface stuff, interrupts, disk controller and RS232 board... Why didn't I do it? Simple. I went to a raido rally to see if I could get any useful bits cheap (like disk drives and PCBs with 179x chips on them) and bought a complete M3. So I didn't need to hack about and build one. My M1 stayed as single densisty, I used the M3 for double-desnisty stuff. And later one I bought asecond-hand M4, which is the machine I use now. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 2 15:20:24 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 21:20:24 +0000 (GMT) Subject: OT: white LEDs In-Reply-To: from "David Griffith" at Mar 1, 10 01:40:52 pm Message-ID: > In the US, there was the All-American Five design that was used by nearly Sure. IIRC there were several versions with octal, single-ended octal (no top caps), all-glass miniatures, etc. Wasn't there even a Loctal version? > all manufacturers for the lower end models. The heaters were wired in > series and the voltage drop added up to 121. That was close enough for > 120VAC and thus the transformer could be omitted. And no dropping resistor either. I seem to remember valves like 12K8 (changer), 12K7 (IF amplifier), 12Q7 (detector/audio amplifier), 50L6 (output) and 35W4 (rectifier). We did get those sets occasionally in the UK. They were fitted with one ofd those 'line cord' dropping resistors to allow them to be used on 240V mains. -tony From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 2 16:52:23 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2010 14:52:23 -0800 Subject: OT: white LEDs In-Reply-To: References: from "David Griffith" at Mar 1, 10 01:40:52 pm, Message-ID: <4B8D2627.27156.1781400@cclist.sydex.com> On 2 Mar 2010 at 21:20, Tony Duell wrote: > Sure. IIRC there were several versions with octal, single-ended octal > (no top caps), all-glass miniatures, etc. Wasn't there even a Loctal > version? Yup, the list was there about a week ago. I liked the novely of the battery-operated portable sets. The Motorola Pixie was one I was fond of, with its submini tubes. My first all-transistor radio was actually larger than the Pixie. --Chuck From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 2 17:01:19 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 15:01:19 -0800 (PST) Subject: User community subsets (Was: Bootable Model III disks... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100302145451.W35252@shell.lmi.net> > Oh, I don;'t maind. I am used to being a 'nobody'... I didn't mean it as abrasively as it came across. I guess that we're almost all nobodies on this bus. > > "EVERYBODY buys the machine fully expanded - it's cheaper that way." > No way! I always thought that that one was silly > > "EVERYBODY has a SCSI card." > > "EVERYBODY has a SCSI card." > Haven't we just had that one Oops. Oh, well. maybe everybody has TWO SCSI cards? > > "EVERYBODY buys generic XT motherboards" > As you well know, I insisted on IBM motherboards becuase I have the > scheamtics for them... I used to have schematics for the "Super" XT motherboard. > > "EVERYBODY buys their generic XT motherboards bare and populates them" > Only if I can get them truely bare and get to solder in every last IC and > resistor... It was actually a lot of fun, and my soldering improved. I even eventually learned to not bother socketing resistor packs and DIP switches. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Mar 2 18:37:40 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2010 17:37:40 -0700 Subject: User community subsets (Was: Bootable Model III disks... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B8DAF54.30500@jetnet.ab.ca> Tony Duell wrote: >> >> On Mon, 1 Mar 2010, Al Hartman wrote: >>> C'mon guys... Nobody with a Model I and E/I with disk drives left it >>> stock without a doubler of some kind... >> >> not stock, but the add-ons were mutually incompatible. >> Sorry, but I must take issue with being a "Nobody". > > Oh, I don;'t maind. I am used to being a 'nobody'... >> "EVERYBODY had . . . " was a common refrain. But, it usually only >> referred to a limited local subset of the community. >> Community subsets were extremely common, and many/most microcomputer users >> were only in touch with others with the same basic configuration they had. >> But, since EVERYBODY did that, NOBODY acknowledged the existence of OTHER >> user community subsets. >> >> >> "EVERYBODY has after-market mods." > > OK, i do, on many of my machines, but not all... > >> "EVERYBODY buys the machine fully expanded - it's cheaper that way." > > No way! > >> "EVERYBODY buys the machine bare and expands it - it's cheaper that way." > > Yes, but not because it's cheaper, but becasue I cna get exactly the > stuff I want... > >> "EVERYBODY uses the RS monitor on their Model 1." > > I do. But I als use the M1 montiro as a composite monitor > (beleive-it-or-not it could manage MDA scan rates...) I have the European > model, of course, with an isolating transformer whcih means it doens't > need 5V fro mthe video source. > >> "EVERYBODY has a clock calendar card. (5150)" > > Plety of my 5150s and 5160s don't... > >> "EVERYBODY has a SCSI card." > > Hmmm.... > >> "EVERYBODY uses ANSI.SYS." > > No I don't.. > >> "EVERYBODY has a SCSI card." > > Haven't we just had that one > >> "EVERYBODY buys generic XT motherboards" > > As you well know, I insisted on IBM motherboards becuase I have the > scheamtics for them... > >> "EVERYBODY buys their generic XT motherboards bare and populates them" > > Only if I can get them truely bare and get to solder in every last IC and > resistor... > >> "EVERYBODY uses a V20 for DOUBLE the speed." > > I don't think I own a V20... > >> "EVERYBODY runs their AT with a faster crystal. (Until IBM altered the >> boot code)" > > Mine is the faser IBM one... > >> "EVERYBODY has 640K on their motherboard." > > Not in the AT (it maxes out tat 512K). Of course I hacked the 5160 (and > 5155) boards to take 640K. > >> "EVERYBODY uses JFORMAT." > > Never heard of it... > >> "EVERYBODY converts their Gavilan to DS." > > Not a machine I've come across in the flesh... > >> "EVERYBODY has voice output." > > Oh yes, _I_ can speak. I am not sauying anything about my machines... > >> "EVERYBODY has added a control key." > > Not on my ASR33... > >> "EVERYBODY has replaced their model 1s with model 3s." >> "EVERYBODY has model 4s, instead of model 3s." >> "EVERYBODY who does graphics uses a Mac." > > PERQ, PDP11, HP9000... > >> "EVERYBODY who uses VisiCalc uses an Apple ][." > > Nope, I run it on an HP75C (seriously) > >> "EVERYBODY has a ZIF socket for their joysticks (Apple ][)" > > Alas not. > >> "EVERYBODY has joysticks, instead of game paddles." > > Does a bitstick count? > >> "EVERYBODY has a Z80 card." > > In what machine? (I suspect you're thinking of the Apple ][, but it was > also a problem on S100 machines (some CP/M software neeeded a Z80 and > wouldn't run on an 8080 or 8085 CPU), and of course there were CP/M > processor add-ons for many other machines) > >> "EVERYBODY uses parallel printers, not serial." > > Is that Centronics parallel or GPIB parallel? :-) > >> "EVERYBODY uses 1200 baud." > > Yes., And plenty of other baud rates from 45.45 upwards... > >> "EVERYBODY rolls their own BIOS" > > Err, yes... > >> "NOBODY uses assembly language any more, nor ever will again" - Clancy& >> Harvey >> . . . > > Last time I wrte assembly language was, oh, a couple of days ago... > >> >> Which of those were true for YOUR circle of friends? >> Which other ones did I leave off? > > "Everybody usese ASCII" > "Everybody has aVAX" > "Everybopdy has a PC" > "Everybody has a Pentium" > "Everybody runs Windows" > "Everybody has a graphical display" > "Everybody has a scanner" > "Everybody has a digital camera" > "Everybody has a USB port" > "Nobody does component-level repair" > > [The last (n-3) of those are false for me, of course...] umm Everybody has the 16KB expansion pack. Used as a door stop here still counts as valid use! > -tony > From rescue at hawkmountain.net Tue Mar 2 21:39:50 2010 From: rescue at hawkmountain.net (Curtis H. Wilbar Jr.) Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2010 22:39:50 -0500 Subject: Northstar Advantage ? Message-ID: <4B8DDA06.2040406@hawkmountain.net> All this talk of S100/Northstar/etc.... make me remember what I believe was a Northstar Advantage I used for a bit in college..... I remember it was laid out like a Radio Shack Model III system... all in one, monochrome screen with 2 floppy drives built in to the right, etc.... I've always wanted to find one of these.... but never have... I'm not sure my memory is even correct (is it the Northstar Advantage ?). Anyone have one in the MA/RI/NH area have one they don't want ? -- Curt From derschjo at mail.msu.edu Tue Mar 2 23:00:55 2010 From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2010 21:00:55 -0800 Subject: Northstar Advantage ? In-Reply-To: <4B8DDA06.2040406@hawkmountain.net> References: <4B8DDA06.2040406@hawkmountain.net> Message-ID: <4B8DED07.1090701@mail.msu.edu> Curtis H. Wilbar Jr. wrote: > > All this talk of S100/Northstar/etc.... make me remember what I > believe was > a Northstar Advantage I used for a bit in college..... > > I remember it was laid out like a Radio Shack Model III system... all > in one, > monochrome screen with 2 floppy drives built in to the right, etc.... > > I've always wanted to find one of these.... but never have... I'm not > sure my > memory is even correct (is it the Northstar Advantage ?). Yep, that describes the Advantage. It's a much *denser* package than the Model III (I swear it weighs like 80 pounds). I have one here (with the optional hard drive) on the shelf. It runs but I get no picture/raster onscreen (the neck of the CRT lights up, however). Seems like the HV section is dead but I'm too chicken around monitors to debug it... > > Anyone have one in the MA/RI/NH area have one they don't want ? I'd offer mine, but I'm on the other side of the continent... - Josh > > -- Curt > > > From gerhard.kreuzer at liftoff.at Tue Mar 2 23:48:30 2010 From: gerhard.kreuzer at liftoff.at (Gerhard Kreuzer) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 06:48:30 +0100 Subject: Identifying a classic board and find software for it ... Message-ID: <89E37204D53A4B35A880E7162F537141@mars> Hi, sombody donates a board to my collection, www.compuseum.at, maybe there is anybody outside helping me to identify this board. Its a PDP11 subsystem on an ISA board. Labels found: AT.S, PCCB ROI-931007. The PDP11 chip is one of this big nice ceramic carrier, holding two chips, numbers were: HD4-6900-5 DC334, produced 9338, and ...6901... repectively. As he told me, they used a standard OS2 box to run this 'machine'. He also will try to find something, but he isn't sure that there is anything left exept this nice board. As far as I know, it was part of a building management system, produced by Landis & Gyr and maybe used or co-developed by Siemens. Thanks for helping Gerhard From rodsmallwood at btconnect.com Wed Mar 3 00:24:29 2010 From: rodsmallwood at btconnect.com (Rod Smallwood) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 06:24:29 -0000 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <20100302130454.X35252@shell.lmi.net> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> <4B8BDE57.6000901@gmail.com><0C14E2A0ECD54044A1963F160F1064C1@RodsDevSystem> <20100302130454.X35252@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <926E32232048438A90640A1AB36E20BC@RodsDevSystem> Sure they were portable and I even have Wordstar for my Rainbow. It?s just a case of what would I run on my restored Horizon when it's completed. If anybody knows the location of the Horizon heavy bits (Case and Transformer) in the UK and any shippable Horizon cards (excluding the motherboard) anywhere I'd be interested. Regards ? Rod Smallwood ? ? -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Fred Cisin Sent: 02 March 2010 21:07 To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: RE: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic On Tue, 2 Mar 2010, Rod Smallwood wrote: > Why the Horizon? I wrote commercial software on it in CBasic using Wordstar > as an editor when the machine was current. CBASIC and Wordstar were both VERY portable. Just about any CP/M machine would satisfy THAT part of the nostalgia. Is it still possible to get plywood of the right thickness to duplicate the top of the Horizon? From bbuckels at mts.net Tue Mar 2 03:06:49 2010 From: bbuckels at mts.net (Bill Buckels) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 03:06:49 -0600 Subject: Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx Message-ID: <017501cab9e7$b27079a0$6501a8c0@davinci> Hello There, I am interested in the Aztec C disks and manuals. I am able to pay shipping costs through paypal. I am in Canada. I am also interested in old computers but unfortunately the shipping costs to Canada make that impractical. Regards, Bill Buckels Box 277 177 - 6th Street South Beach Gimli, MB, Canada R0C 1B0 Home - (204) 642-8405 Cell - (204) 612-4162 Please see my links below: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Bill_Buckels http://www.cpm8680.com/ http://www.appleoldies.ca/ http://www.c64classics.ca/ http://www.aztecmuseum.ca/ x--- snip ---x Sanyo CP/M machine and Macintosh IIfx David Betz dbetz at xlisper.com Sun Feb 28 22:47:58 CST 2010 I have a friend who has a Sanyo MBC-1000 and a Macintosh IIfx with both a two page monochrome monitor (nicknamed the "Kong") and a 13" color monitor that he'd like to pass on to someone who will appreciate them. The catch is that they are in the San Francisco Bay Area and would need to be picked up within the next few days. I am in the area right now and could help with the pickup but I am leaving the Bay Area on Friday. If anyone is interested in one or both of these machines, please contact me off list. His description of the Sanyo is: "Sanyo MBC-1000. I've got manuals and software, including Aztec-C and BIOS source. The computer itself is very solid and was in perfect working condition when I last used it." If I don't find someone to pick up these machines in the next few days they will likely go to a recycler. From rikbos at xs4all.nl Tue Mar 2 12:50:16 2010 From: rikbos at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2010 19:50:16 +0100 Subject: HP 9825 tape drive Message-ID: I modified a HP 9825A tape drive for use with QIC 40/80 tapes. It's a rather easy conversion building a new capstand wheel witch is a little higher so it can drive the QIC tapes and increasing the write current by replacing a the current limiter resistor. It's under test and at the moment seems to work. I was curious if there others who did the same and what theire experiances are... -Rik From arcbe2001 at yahoo.com Wed Mar 3 06:45:59 2010 From: arcbe2001 at yahoo.com (Russ Bartlett) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 04:45:59 -0800 (PST) Subject: flowcharts and teaching programming In-Reply-To: <4B8AC7B1.70602@softjar.se> Message-ID: <804408.88587.qm@web110401.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> I know - and I had intended to refer explicitly to IV which? would also have inferred II etc. I never used 66 so could not comment at that level.? I did use 77 though and know that it was changed.? I was comparing earlier Cobol (68) with earlier Fortran iter construct. ?? --- On Sun, 2/28/10, Johnny Billquist wrote: From: Johnny Billquist Subject: Re: flowcharts and teaching programming To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Date: Sunday, February 28, 2010, 2:44 PM uss Bartlett wrote: > Don't forget that the DO loop in Fortan has not the same effect as an iteration as the Do condition is performed at the end.? The DO component is therefore performed at least once.? An iteration must be able to be performed zero times.?? This was why in JSP it wasn't used. It differs. What you describe is how it is in FORTRAN IV and older. It was changed in FORTRAN 77, so that a DO loop can run zero number of times as well. ??? 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 hp-fix at xs4all.nl Wed Mar 3 11:13:27 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 18:13:27 +0100 Subject: HP 9825 tape drive In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <175F04D3E5E2473A98D140723B5EA0CA@xp1800> Please neglect this one ! -Rik > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Rik Bos > Verzonden: dinsdag 2 maart 2010 19:50 > Aan: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts' > Onderwerp: HP 9825 tape drive > > I modified a HP 9825A tape drive for use with QIC 40/80 tapes. > It's a rather easy conversion building a new capstand wheel > witch is a little higher so it can drive the QIC tapes and > increasing the write current by replacing a the current > limiter resistor. > It's under test and at the moment seems to work. > I was curious if there others who did the same and what > theire experiances are... > > -Rik From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 3 12:48:42 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 18:48:42 +0000 (GMT) Subject: OT: white LEDs In-Reply-To: <4B8D2627.27156.1781400@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 2, 10 02:52:23 pm Message-ID: > I liked the novely of the battery-operated portable sets. The > Motorola Pixie was one I was fond of, with its submini tubes. My > first all-transistor radio was actually larger than the Pixie. So do I. I have a portable radio about the size of a large-ish transistorised set. But it's valved. And it covers MW (AM broadcast band), LW _and_ Band 2 FM (FM broadcast band). I think it cheats by having a couple of germanium diodes in the detector stage, but all the amplifying stages are valves. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 3 12:53:39 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 18:53:39 +0000 (GMT) Subject: User community subsets (Was: Bootable Model III disks... In-Reply-To: <20100302145451.W35252@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Mar 2, 10 03:01:19 pm Message-ID: > > > Oh, I don;'t maind. I am used to being a 'nobody'... > > I didn't mean it as abrasively as it came across. > I guess that we're almost all nobodies on this bus. S100 Bus>? Unibus? (sorry, couldn't resist, this is classiccmp ;-)) > > > "EVERYBODY buys generic XT motherboards" > > As you well know, I insisted on IBM motherboards becuase I have the > > scheamtics for them... > > I used to have schematics for the "Super" XT motherboard. Hmmm... Some other manufactuers sold service manuals containing scheamtics of their PC machines. Amstrad certainly did (I have some of them). I am pretty sure Radio Shack did (they sold service manuals for just about eveything else, even their re-baded Sharp/Casio pocket computers). I have one of the Commodore PC-clone schemaitcs too. > > > > "EVERYBODY buys their generic XT motherboards bare and populates them" > > Only if I can get them truely bare and get to solder in every last IC and > > resistor... > > It was actually a lot of fun, and my soldering improved. I even Yes, I find stuffing PCBs to be remarkably restful. A pleasant break from designing or debugging... > eventually learned to not bother socketing resistor packs and DIP > switches. The problem with socketing DIP switches is that they tend to come out of the socket when you flip them if you're not careful. On the other hand, having just replaced sevral DIP swithces on plated-through-hole PCBs in an HP2631 printer -- all the DIP swithces had failed...), I wish they'd been in sockets... -tony From teoz at neo.rr.com Wed Mar 3 15:57:34 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 16:57:34 -0500 Subject: Anybody in Gardena CA like free old macs? Message-ID: http://68kmla.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=12990&p=126641#p126641 From brad at heeltoe.com Wed Mar 3 15:57:45 2010 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 16:57:45 -0500 Subject: Cayman GatorBox CS firmware update issues In-Reply-To: <201002270653.02090.thrashbarg@kaput.homeunix.org> (sfid-20100226_154037_835584_90408C17) References: <201002270653.02090.thrashbarg@kaput.homeunix.org> (sfid-20100226_154037_835584_90408C17) Message-ID: <649630E5-4483-4A08-9D8E-3AE0239B9EFA@heeltoe.com> On Feb 26, 2010, at 3:23 PM, Alexis wrote: > A friend of mine gave me a GatorBox CS recently. It works nicely, but the > firmware version is 1.6.1. I tried to update it to 3.0.3 with the software at > http://alfter.us/files/gatorbox/gatorbox-cs/ but when it goes to reboot into > update mode it stops with the Ethernet LED on. The same thing happens when I > try to do a software reset. A power cycle gets it unlocked but it's no longer > in update mode. Any thoughts? you can probably blame me for any bugs in that, but it was a very long time ago. I might try going it again. If it still doesn't work, I can ask around. I think I have a CS somewhere in a pre-production "clear" case (we shot about 20 of them in clear and in black just for fun to do form & fit - I think the were made in Taiwan) I think I have a pb40 laptop which still boots with the software on it. I can try the upgrade here. -brad From silent700 at gmail.com Wed Mar 3 16:11:50 2010 From: silent700 at gmail.com (Jason T) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 16:11:50 -0600 Subject: Anybody in Gardena CA like free old macs? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <51ea77731003031411y217de5ecwda6d2ebacfc1a916@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Mar 3, 2010 at 3:57 PM, Teo Zenios wrote: > http://68kmla.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=12990&p=126641#p126641 Looks like registration is required to view the post :( From alhartman at yahoo.com Wed Mar 3 16:27:57 2010 From: alhartman at yahoo.com (Al Hartman) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 14:27:57 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bootable Model III Disks... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <402829.71019.qm@web55306.mail.re4.yahoo.com> Nope, not gonna take it back. In my circle of users in Brooklyn, EVERYBODY with a Model I had a doubler if they had disk drives. EVERYBODY. I'm sure there are people on this list who didn't. Because you guys can be pretty stubborn, ornery and non-standard. But anyone with a Model I who didn't get a doubler locked themselves out of lots of software, halved the storage capacity of their system, and had lots of trouble reading disks. I bought my system as a 16k Level I, and upgraded it to a 4 drive 48k Level II. Many people upgraded piecemeal. And a doubler was one of those "must have" upgrades. That was my experience. Having worked for Stony Clove Computer Center, Spectrum Projects, Zebra Systems, Colorware and Alpha Products. Al From adrian at adrianwise.co.uk Wed Mar 3 16:49:51 2010 From: adrian at adrianwise.co.uk (Adrian Wise) Date: Wed, 03 Mar 2010 22:49:51 +0000 Subject: Honeywell CC690 uPAC Message-ID: <4B8EE78F.5040706@adrianwise.co.uk> I have a couple of uPAC modules from either a Honeywell DDP-516 or just possibly from a H316 machine. They're marked CC690. They're obviously some form of bus termination - just a series of clamp diodes to GND and some lines with pull-ups to +6V. The normal I/O bus termination on a DDP-516 is CC154, and I'm pretty sure that there is no termination uPAC needed on a 316. These were pulled from a machine in about 1984. I have some distant memory that they are an "upgraded" CC154 and can be used in place of a CC154. Can anyone confirm that - either from documentation or just from recollection? Adrian From curt at atarimuseum.com Wed Mar 3 17:20:10 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Wed, 03 Mar 2010 18:20:10 -0500 Subject: Anybody in Gardena CA like free old macs? In-Reply-To: <51ea77731003031411y217de5ecwda6d2ebacfc1a916@mail.gmail.com> References: <51ea77731003031411y217de5ecwda6d2ebacfc1a916@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B8EEEAA.40503@atarimuseum.com> We're cleaning out our office/shop and have various Macs and software available for the asking. I am posting this here because I'd rather have someone who appreciates our old computers/software to have them instead of trashing/recycling them. There are some conditions: THIS IS FOR LOCAL PICKUP ONLY. You will have to come to us. WE WILL NOT SHIP ANYTHING ANYWHERE. This offer is for a limited time. We cannot "wait" until you're on vacation or until your uncle, with the truck, can come by. This is first come first served, You Snooze You Lose offer. These machines and parts will be disposed of if not picked up by 3-12-10. You will take everything or nothing. Most of what we have is working, some is not and what isn't working has significant usable parts. We are located in Gardena, California near the 110, 91 and 105 freeways. Phone for directions and time to pickup: 310-516-1915. You must call first before arriving. Leave message if no one picks up. We're here but may be busy in the back.... Here is a short list of what's waiting: (the Apple IIgs and the AST computers in the picture ARE NOT included in what's available) 4 SE/30's: 2 working, 2 not working (the working machines HDs will be wiped clean leaving the existing OS) 1 Lot SE/30 parts (motherboards, power supplies, Hard disks) 1 Radius Color Pivot/LE w/board and software (was working when pulled from service) 1 Lot external CD Drives 2 PPC 8500/150 not working (will need to reassemble from parts box) 1 Lot of software- 4D, MacDraft, tons more (I don't have a list). Almost all has original Dox and all have original disks (3.5's). Jason T wrote: > On Wed, Mar 3, 2010 at 3:57 PM, Teo Zenios wrote: > >> http://68kmla.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=12990&p=126641#p126641 >> > > Looks like registration is required to view the post :( > > From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 3 18:18:53 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 19:18:53 -0500 Subject: Cayman GatorBox CS firmware update issues In-Reply-To: <649630E5-4483-4A08-9D8E-3AE0239B9EFA@heeltoe.com> References: <201002270653.02090.thrashbarg@kaput.homeunix.org> (sfid-20100226_154037_835584_90408C17) <649630E5-4483-4A08-9D8E-3AE0239B9EFA@heeltoe.com> Message-ID: <61AAE489-6FF8-48C5-B192-5244A6361C1C@neurotica.com> On Mar 3, 2010, at 4:57 PM, Brad Parker wrote: >> A friend of mine gave me a GatorBox CS recently. It works nicely, >> but the >> firmware version is 1.6.1. I tried to update it to 3.0.3 with the >> software at >> http://alfter.us/files/gatorbox/gatorbox-cs/ but when it goes to >> reboot into >> update mode it stops with the Ethernet LED on. The same thing >> happens when I >> try to do a software reset. A power cycle gets it unlocked but >> it's no longer >> in update mode. Any thoughts? > > you can probably blame me for any bugs in that, but it was a very > long time ago. You wrote that firmware? Cool! I've had quite a few of those boxes go through my hands. I might even have one or two left in storage. They were always great boxes. > I might try going it again. If it still doesn't work, I can ask > around. I think I have > a CS somewhere in a pre-production "clear" case (we shot about 20 > of them in > clear and in black just for fun to do form & fit - I think the were > made in Taiwan) Neat! -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From fjgjr1 at aol.com Wed Mar 3 21:45:07 2010 From: fjgjr1 at aol.com (fjgjr1 at aol.com) Date: Wed, 03 Mar 2010 22:45:07 -0500 Subject: RESPONSE - Re: Free for pickup - update - MicroC magazines - Roy fromIllinoisplease reply.. In-Reply-To: <4B8AD507.3800.24FB3E4@cclist.sydex.com> References: <814220.37190.qm@web50702.mail.re2.yahoo.com>, <4B8950E7.2780.1C38E44@cclist.sydex.com>, <8CC870973E3AAD1-9774-2AB3E@webmail-d005.sysops.aol.com> <4B8AD507.3800.24FB3E4@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <8CC896437CAB595-4E70-7EC8@webmail-d057.sysops.aol.com> Wednesday, March 03, 2010 My response to your email on copyright in computing Chuck, Thank you so much! I am just trying to understand all this. Any ?hints? on David would be much appreciated. It is very understandable that he just walked away as IBM and their clones took over, especially after all he was doing and had done. That is all part of my science, technology and society [STS] research, much on my website ? WWW.KAYPROSTS.ORG - which will be greatly improved, upgraded, updated, etc. now that we finally have cable in our very rural area. Right now I am backed up on a number of STS projects, but I hope to get something to David in the next week Priority Mail. But I know that it must be good, since it may be the only chance I have. Others may also be bombarding him with inquiries also. Whatever he decides, we have to respect it. But it would be shame if all his work and those at MicroC is not kept alive and it is allowed just to die. So many can still profit from it in so many ways. Also, such computer history can be preserved. Since I am a now retired chemist, the following just came this week - Chemical and Engineering News [C&EN] 02/22/2010 page 41 [WWW.CEN-ONLINE.ORG] - "Professors Cry Foul Over Website" article by Bethany Halford of C&EN Northeast News Bureau ? on copy infringement selling professors course materials including old tests on the web ! So you have enough to find this information yourself. I can send you a copy of this one page article [e.g., fair use naturally copyright wise], if you need it. American Chemical Society [ACS] that publishes this trade magazine quotes Eric S. Slater, their manager of copyright permissions and licensing for the ACS, states that "Anything that a professor creates for his class - lecture notes, PowerPoint presentations - is copyrighted." But hassle is doing the paper work to get them to stop. Launched January 2008, Course Hero founded by Andrew T. Grauer, is the web site and charges $40 / month, but some other options for payment. He claims 450,000 members and materials from about 3500 colleges and universities ? total documents over 6 million ! So we are talking ?big time here !? But much of this information is ?for free? on the various websites of the professors. The professors did not know their ?intellectual property? was being sold ! They certainly did not give any permissions for such uses. I totally agree, we have a long way to go here. This is only the beginning. As you must know, the whole music industry, among many others, are also dealing with this in so many ways. You can check my web site out for my background ? WWW.KAYPROSTS.ORG. I was involved with about a decade of lawsuits with one of my employers over their very serious safety, hazardous waste, environmental issues / violations. Much more info if you need it. So I am very sensitive to the legal process and laws. It is not what you think it is after you have been involved with it so long. You may already be aware of such matters. So all these people better be very careful ! There already have been some ?incidents? as you probably are aware of. But all we can do is to alert them. Then it is their decision. Unfortunately, many times some people have to be seriously hurt, especially financially, before the message gets thru. Certainly this web site has made it very clear in so many posts about copyright issues. Much more info from my end, if you are interested. Just ask if you have any questions or if something is not clear. My only motivation is to try to do our best for this fantastic hobby of vintage computers. It has been a new world for me. Thanks again so much! Frank -----Original Message----- From: Chuck Guzis To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Sent: Sun, Feb 28, 2010 11:41 pm Subject: Re: Free for pickup - update - MicroC magazines - Roy fromIllinoisplease reply.. On 28 Feb 2010 at 22:50, fjgjr1 at aol.com wrote: > Puzzling - why bitsavers and some others are distributing these copyrighted materials? Frank, bitsavers is part of the CHM, and Al Kossow does get ermission where possible--he also has a policy that if someone omplains about a copyright violation, that the material is removed mmediately. As an archivist, he does a very good job. But you will see that his BM material cuts off with the S/390. No AS/400 or anything about he PC line. This is because IBM does not wish to give permission to o that. At some point, especially given Google's publishing material from agazines such as InfoWorld and PCWeek, I think the final rules on lectronic distribution haven't been written yet. The best of luck with David! Cheers, huck From brianlanning at gmail.com Wed Mar 3 23:19:07 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 23:19:07 -0600 Subject: would this work? Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003032119x3d223b6cq3b5c24265cce8cd4@mail.gmail.com> Forgive my lack of hardware knowledge... What if I took this: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=310201616232&rvr_id=&crlp=1_263602_263622&UA=WVF%3F&GUID=fbd9ae461220a0437161e4b1ffdf44f7&itemid=310201616232&ff4=263602_263622 Desoldered the female ISA connector, then soldered it to the underside of a passive backplane. Would I have goofy reliability problems? Would it even work? brian From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 3 23:36:51 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 03 Mar 2010 21:36:51 -0800 Subject: would this work? In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003032119x3d223b6cq3b5c24265cce8cd4@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003032119x3d223b6cq3b5c24265cce8cd4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B8ED673.13343.2D6DF29@cclist.sydex.com> On 3 Mar 2010 at 23:19, Brian Lanning wrote: > Desoldered the female ISA connector, then soldered it to the underside > of a passive backplane. Would I have goofy reliability problems? > Would it even work? I don't follow you. Are you trying to replace/add a connector to an existing backplane because an existing one is faulty? --Chuck From fryers at gmail.com Thu Mar 4 01:22:46 2010 From: fryers at gmail.com (Simon Fryer) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 07:22:46 +0000 Subject: would this work? In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003032119x3d223b6cq3b5c24265cce8cd4@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003032119x3d223b6cq3b5c24265cce8cd4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: G'day, On 4 March 2010 05:19, Brian Lanning wrote: [ISA Bus Extender for Maintenance / Debugging] > Desoldered the female ISA connector, then soldered it to the underside of a > passive backplane. Would I have goofy reliability problems? Would it even > work? AFAIK, the ISA bus works sufficiently slowly that it doesn't need to be treated like a transmission line. So, if it does work, it probably will. How are you intending to swap the pins? If you solder the connector straight to the underside of the motherboard, mounting the ISA card up side down, the pins on each side of the ISA connector will be incorrect. Simon -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Well, an engineer is not concerned with the truth; that is left to philosophers and theologians: the prime concern of an engineer is the utility of the final product." Lectures on the Electrical Properties of Materials, L.Solymar, D.Walsh From jws at jwsss.com Wed Mar 3 20:43:13 2010 From: jws at jwsss.com (jim s) Date: Wed, 03 Mar 2010 18:43:13 -0800 Subject: Anybody in Gardena CA like free old macs? In-Reply-To: <4B8EEEAA.40503@atarimuseum.com> References: <51ea77731003031411y217de5ecwda6d2ebacfc1a916@mail.gmail.com> <4B8EEEAA.40503@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <4B8F1E41.4050204@jwsss.com> I'm about an hour from him. I'm at 5&57&22 freeways, with good traffic and carpool dummy, can drive and return 1 hr each way. Might like an SE/30 but rest of no interest to me at current time. I collect microdata, mainframe docs, would trade trip for help on some projects, interested parties contact me offline thru the list email. I also have a project not list appropriate, but mac related if someone wants it and has osx experience. I could add a range of my other mac stuff to the pile, but would have to inventory it. also contact offline. jim On 3/3/2010 3:20 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > We're cleaning out our office/shop and have various Macs and software > available for the asking. I am posting this here because I'd rather > have someone who appreciates our old computers/software to have them > instead of trashing/recycling them. > > There are some conditions: > > THIS IS FOR LOCAL PICKUP ONLY. You will have to come to us. WE WILL > NOT SHIP ANYTHING ANYWHERE. > > This offer is for a limited time. We cannot "wait" until you're on > vacation or until your uncle, with the truck, can come by. This is > first come first served, You Snooze You Lose offer. These machines and > parts will be disposed of if not picked up by 3-12-10. > > You will take everything or nothing. Most of what we have is working, > some is not and what isn't working has significant usable parts. > > We are located in Gardena, California near the 110, 91 and 105 freeways. > > Phone for directions and time to pickup: 310-516-1915. You must call > first before arriving. Leave message if no one picks up. We're here > but may be busy in the back.... > > > > Here is a short list of what's waiting: > > (the Apple IIgs and the AST computers in the picture ARE NOT included > in what's available) > > 4 SE/30's: 2 working, 2 not working (the working machines HDs will be > wiped clean leaving the existing OS) > 1 Lot SE/30 parts (motherboards, power supplies, Hard disks) > 1 Radius Color Pivot/LE w/board and software (was working when pulled > from service) > 1 Lot external CD Drives > 2 PPC 8500/150 not working (will need to reassemble from parts box) > 1 Lot of software- 4D, MacDraft, tons more (I don't have a list). > Almost all has original Dox and all have original disks (3.5's). > > Jason T wrote: >> On Wed, Mar 3, 2010 at 3:57 PM, Teo Zenios wrote: >>> http://68kmla.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=12990&p=126641#p126641 >> >> Looks like registration is required to view the post :( >> > > From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Thu Mar 4 04:25:15 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 11:25:15 +0100 Subject: would this work? In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003032119x3d223b6cq3b5c24265cce8cd4@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003032119x3d223b6cq3b5c24265cce8cd4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Brian Lanning > Verzonden: donderdag 4 maart 2010 6:19 > Aan: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Onderwerp: would this work? > > Forgive my lack of hardware knowledge... > > What if I took this: > > http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=31020161623 > 2&rvr_id=&crlp=1_263602_263622&UA=WVF%3F&GUID=fbd9ae461220a043 7161e4b1ffdf44f7&itemid=310201616232&ff4=263602_263622 > > Desoldered the female ISA connector, then soldered it to the > underside of a passive backplane. Would I have goofy > reliability problems? Would it even work? > > brian If I understand you right, you're soldering the ISA connector to the bottom of another ISA connector. If so, all the signals are mirrored on the ISA connector you soldered on the backside, it woudn't work just smoke ;-) -Rik From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 4 07:02:38 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 07:02:38 -0600 Subject: would this work? In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003032119x3d223b6cq3b5c24265cce8cd4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003040502m2f980f6cseb395f57e1e6c49b@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 4, 2010 at 1:22 AM, Simon Fryer wrote: > AFAIK, the ISA bus works sufficiently slowly that it doesn't need to > be treated like a transmission line. So, if it does work, it probably > will. > > How are you intending to swap the pins? If you solder the connector > straight to the underside of the motherboard, mounting the ISA card up > side down, the pins on each side of the ISA connector will be > incorrect. > I wasn't real clear with the original email. The idea is to add more isa slots to a computer without having to pay for a really expensive bus extender. I thought about the pin orientation. I'm thinking with this thing, I could make the female edge connector on this replace one of the slots on the passive back plane. That would fix the orientation problem, right? So the passive back plane would be parallel to and above the main motherboard of the computer. This riser board would plug into the main motherboard. And the connector on the other end could be desoldered and the riser board resoldered to the underside of the passibe back plane. The slots on the passive back plane wouldn't face the main motherboard, they'd face away. Does that make sense? What I'd really like to do is get a female to female adapter for the isa bus and just plug that into the motherboard and the passive back plane, making the slot sides of the two boards face each other. But I think that would cause the orientation problem you're describing. Is that right? brian From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 4 07:04:20 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 07:04:20 -0600 Subject: would this work? In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003032119x3d223b6cq3b5c24265cce8cd4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003040504y6b2b7bd2h1e4b9c7d1ef8b234@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 4, 2010 at 4:25 AM, Rik Bos wrote: > If I understand you right, you're soldering the ISA connector to the bottom > of another ISA connector. > If so, all the signals are mirrored on the ISA connector you soldered on > the > backside, it woudn't work just smoke ;-) > I said it poorly. Desolder the female isa connector on the riser board and throw it away. Then solder the riser board to the underside of the passive backplane. brian From christian_liendo at yahoo.com Thu Mar 4 07:35:37 2010 From: christian_liendo at yahoo.com (Christian Liendo) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 05:35:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: An interview with Sir Clive Sinclair In-Reply-To: <926E32232048438A90640A1AB36E20BC@RodsDevSystem> Message-ID: <977583.19371.qm@web113511.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> This is an amusing read considering the computer he launched. http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/feb/28/clive-sinclair-interview-simon-garfield From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Mar 4 07:49:57 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 04 Mar 2010 07:49:57 -0600 Subject: would this work? In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003032119x3d223b6cq3b5c24265cce8cd4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B8FBA85.4070804@gmail.com> Simon Fryer wrote: > G'day, > > On 4 March 2010 05:19, Brian Lanning wrote: > > [ISA Bus Extender for Maintenance / Debugging] > >> Desoldered the female ISA connector, then soldered it to the underside of a >> passive backplane. Would I have goofy reliability problems? Would it even >> work? > > AFAIK, the ISA bus works sufficiently slowly that it doesn't need to > be treated like a transmission line. So, if it does work, it probably > will. Yes, IME it seems to accept a lot of abuse without problems (I remember building a "poor man's X terminal" once into a case about 30cm high using stock PC hardware and net-booting Linux - I employed some creative cutting of an ISA extender, removing unecessary sockets and PCB to reduce height, so that I could run the video and network boards parallel to the motherboard) It's probably slow enough (8MHz, IIRC) that Brian could even use shielded ribbon cable to connect his motherboard to his backplane and it'd still work - although perhaps such a permanent solution isn't what he's after. cheers Jules From keithvz at verizon.net Thu Mar 4 09:20:06 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Thu, 04 Mar 2010 10:20:06 -0500 Subject: percom data separator Message-ID: <4B8FCFA6.5030509@verizon.net> I've read some passing threads about the percom data separator. Sounds pretty neat. Anyone have schematic, or know the chips involved -- or can tell me how this thing did its job? Thanks Keith From teoz at neo.rr.com Thu Mar 4 09:44:49 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 10:44:49 -0500 Subject: Anybody in Gardena CA like free old macs? References: <51ea77731003031411y217de5ecwda6d2ebacfc1a916@mail.gmail.com><4B8EEEAA.40503@atarimuseum.com> <4B8F1E41.4050204@jwsss.com> Message-ID: <3FDF6A126C2D40A8B589BBE8CA4DF299@dell8300> ----- Original Message ----- From: "jim s" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Wednesday, March 03, 2010 9:43 PM Subject: Re: Anybody in Gardena CA like free old macs? > I'm about an hour from him. I'm at 5&57&22 freeways, with good traffic > and carpool dummy, can drive and return 1 hr each way. Might like an > SE/30 but rest of no interest to me at current time. I collect microdata, > mainframe docs, would trade trip for help on some projects, interested > parties contact me offline thru the list email. > > I also have a project not list appropriate, but mac related if someone > wants it and has osx experience. I could add a range of my other mac > stuff to the pile, but would have to inventory it. also contact offline. > jim > Well if you do pick it up (I think it is all or nothing), I would take the software off your hands (I collect old mac software and would like all those CAD apps he has). No OSX experience here, barely used it. From sellam at vintagetech.com Thu Mar 4 10:13:30 2010 From: sellam at vintagetech.com (Sellam Ismail) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 08:13:30 -0800 (PST) Subject: Looking for MikroMikko 3 manuals ($$$) Message-ID: Here's an obscure one. I need to find some manuals for the Nokia MikroMikko 3 computer from the mid-1980s. Perhaps someone from the Scandanavian countries might be able to assist? Specifically, I'm looking for the "RTX II Monitor Manual User's Guide" and the "RTX II File Management Reference Manual and User's Guide". Originals or PDFs will do at this point. I'm offering a negotiable bounty on this one. Let me know if you have any and what it would cost to get either the manual or a copy. 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 Thu Mar 4 12:11:41 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 04 Mar 2010 10:11:41 -0800 Subject: percom data separator In-Reply-To: <4B8FCFA6.5030509@verizon.net> References: <4B8FCFA6.5030509@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B8F875D.26445.901224@cclist.sydex.com> On 4 Mar 2010 at 10:20, Keith wrote: > I've read some passing threads about the percom data separator. > > Sounds pretty neat. > > Anyone have schematic, or know the chips involved -- or can tell me > how this thing did its job? You could almost draw the schematic from this photo: http://www.oldatheart.co.uk/trsmod1-6.jpeg It appears to be your basic one-shot data separator (or "seperator" if you wrote the techref for WD). This appears to be a later production version, as the original versions had 10-turn trimpots where the 5% resistors are. Doubtless someone figured at the factory that the expensive pots could be replaced by fixed resistances at some point. What's most puzzling is the use of an MC836P DTL hex inverter. Did all boards have this part? There were certainly much better data separator circuits at the time-- you need only look at the 1771 app notes. Why Tandy decided to use the 1771 on-chip separator is a mystery, particularly when WD made no secret of the fact that it was terrible. Even the onboard SA-800 separator was better. --Chuck From jack.rubin at ameritech.net Thu Mar 4 12:37:14 2010 From: jack.rubin at ameritech.net (Jack Rubin) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 10:37:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: Micro Cornucopia and Dave Thompson Message-ID: <9999.8237.qm@web83716.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> Just a quick update to save a little nailbiting and head scratching - Dave Thompson is _not_ at the phone number/address listed under his name in Bend OR. His ex-wife answered the phone and was not particularly interested in providing information on Dave or his current whereabouts - "some where in the Valley, I think..." was her answer when asked. Maybe a Priority Mailing may do better but I don't think so. I've also contacted several former Micro C staff/contributors and basically the story seems to be that Dave pretty much walked away from the computer scene and doesn't particularly want to be "found" at this point. My plan is to scan the full run (I've finished 37-53 and am waiting for the earlier issues to arrive). I'll post them (either on my site or somewhere else) with the notation that they will be removed on request. This stuff is too cool to be left moldering in old boxes. Jack From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 4 13:02:28 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 04 Mar 2010 11:02:28 -0800 Subject: Micro Cornucopia and Dave Thompson In-Reply-To: <9999.8237.qm@web83716.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> References: <9999.8237.qm@web83716.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4B8F9344.26611.BE9270@cclist.sydex.com> On 4 Mar 2010 at 10:37, Jack Rubin wrote: > Just a quick update to save a little nailbiting and head scratching - > > Dave Thompson is _not_ at the phone number/address listed under his > name in Bend OR. His ex-wife answered the phone and was not > particularly interested in providing information on Dave or his > current whereabouts - "some where in the Valley, I think..." was her > answer when asked. Maybe a Priority Mailing may do better but I don't > think so. Good work, Jack. Domestic issues can certainly cause a disruption and this wouldn't be the first time that something like this has happened in the computer business. --Chuck From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 4 13:00:45 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 19:00:45 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Bootable Model III Disks... In-Reply-To: <402829.71019.qm@web55306.mail.re4.yahoo.com> from "Al Hartman" at Mar 3, 10 02:27:57 pm Message-ID: > > Nope, not gonna take it back. It is extremely unscientific to stick to a statement when you have clear evidence to the contrary. > In my circle of users in Brooklyn, EVERYBODY with a Model I had a > doubler if they had disk drives. EVERYBODY. This is a ninternational list. I qould guess there are many people here (including mysef) who have never been to Brooklyn. > > I'm sure there are people on this list who didn't. Because you guys > can be pretty stubborn, ornery and non-standard. > > But anyone with a Model I who didn't get a doubler locked themselves > out of lots of software, halved the storage capacity of their system, I cna think of many things that were M3-only. But I can't think of one M1 title that required double-density disks. > and had lots of trouble reading disks. This is soemthing I can't explain. I have a 'stock' M1 EI, using the internal data separator of the 1771. I never had _any_ problems with it. It read disks with no isseus at all. I had many more problems with the M3 (first of all that infernal tapewire cable between the CPU board and the disk controller board, and in fact I had to replace the 1793 chip in the M3 at least once). Oh well... As I said, I was seriously ocnsidering a Doubler, but finding an M3 at a low price removed the need for it... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 4 14:33:16 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 20:33:16 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP2631B printer Message-ID: You may rememebr that a few weeks ago I asked ofr help on the encoder of an HP2631B printer. I've not sorted it all out, and will describe what I did... The initial problem was a defective 2114 RAM (!) on the procesosr board. After replacign that, the printer rammed the carriage into the side of the mechanmism, blowing the 2 motor driver transistors and an overvoltage zenenr on the -20V line. Furtehr tests showd there were no signals coming from the shaft encoder on the carriage movement leadscrew. I took the machine apart. Really apart. Not having the special tools to remove the encoder form the leadscrew, I found I could take them out together, You loosen the cap screw in the collar on the carriage motor shafter, free the ribbon cable from the cips onthe rear paper guide, and tkae out the 3 screws from the encoder mounting plate. The whole lot this comes out of the right hand side of the mechamism. I could then remove the end cover from the encoder (carring the IR emitter) and the little cover over the cable connections. The HP service manual warns you not t oremove the carriage rails or platten bar, since 'an important adjustment will be upset'. I reckoned that my pritner was in a pretty bad state already, and little could make it any worde, so I took it all apart. I am wondering what the HP manaul is talking about. The 2 carriage rails have their ends turned down to fit in holes i nthe side plate, so theres no way they can be moved by more than a few thou. And these ends are not eccentric, I checked. The platten bar is locared by dowel pins to each side plate. It can't move either. As far as I can see there is no problem at all with completely stripping the mechanism. This meant I could deal with that substance well-know to all classic computer people -- sound-deadening foam that turns to dust. Back to the enconder. The person who said 'sounds like the IR emitter is out' was vey close. The IR emitter was indeed not glowing. The reason was that it's conencted to the rest of the encoder by 2 little pin sockets on the emeltter assembly (encoder end cover) which fit onto wires coming out of the enocderr boddy -- one of them seems to be the end of a current limiting resistor... Anyway, one of those wires was bent and not connecting to the emitter assembly. Easy to fix when you know where to look! I crelaced the shorted zneer diode on the PSU board, and did some simple checks on the rest of the electronics. The DIP switches on the priner logic PCB and HPIB conenctor PCB were not reliable. Since an HPIB address swithc which doesn't set the address you expect is going to be a curse, I replaced them. I managed to re-stake the puchbutton assemblies on the control panel PCB -- http://www.parts.agilent.com indicates that type of switch (plastic housing heat-staked to a PCB with gold contact pads) is still avaialbe, but only if you return the instrument to Agilent for repair. Sorry, but no way... With everything back together (apart from the motor driver transistors), it was time to give it a go. I could now see that the encoder was producing pulses, that the end sensors worked, and that it wasn't trying to turn on both motor driver transsitors at the same time. Powered down, fitted the (expensive, 25A) motor driver transistors, and tried again with the lesdscrew nut unscrewed from the carriage. The idea was that if the motor 'ran away', it wouldn't slam the carriage into the side plate. Tjhis time on power-up the mtoor ran -- but at a sensible speed, there were plento of pulses from the encoder, and by just touching the leadscrew nut I found it was indeed trying to drive the carriage to the left. Time fore the real test. I ffittd the 3 screws holding the leadscrew nut to the carriage, and tired again. The carriage went to the home position, and the macjhine gave a long beep. The frontpanel buttons did nothing apart from reset (which repeated the initialisation) and On-Line which caused it to beep again. I tried frobbing the paper-out switch, it made no difference, so I guessed I had a real fault. I spend 2 hours looking at signals. The peocessor was clearly running. The end sensor signals were fine. The enocder, position counters, direction flip-flop, and so on all seemed to be doing the right things. I was beginning to think i had a nasty fault in the custom HP procesosr chip. And yet, it was running the firmware, at least enough to run the carriage to the home position, sound the beeper, and so on. Checking what the processor ws trying to do to the pritner logic PCB indicated it was reading the sensors and writng to the carriage motor register, which made sense. It wasn't randoming acccessing all the ports. What had I missed? I went back to the paper out signal. It was high (indicating out-of-paprr) at the input pin of the 3-state buffer on the printer logic PCB. It was low on the motor harness pin on the PSU board (that makes sense, there's a NOT gate on the PSU board which inverts this sigal). But it didn't change state when I frobbed the microswitch. Aha... Although the microswitch is hidden inside the printer mechanism, I managed to disconenct one of the faston terminals from it (the switch is closed when out of paper). This time when I powered the machine up, it homed the carriage and didn't beep. I could do linefeeds and formfeeds from the panel, the on-line button worked, and the self-test seemed to be trying to print something (I'd not fitted the printhead at this stage. So the microswtich was faulty. Strangely it was stuck closed (most switch porblems cause them to not make contact). I removed the printer mechanism again, turned it over, and removed the rear paper guide (4 screws). 2 mores screws released the microswitch from the guide. And it didn't 'click' when I pressed the actuating lever. Unfortunately, although it's a standard V3 size switch, the actuator is unusual, so getting a replacement would be nnon-trivial. With nothing to lose, I drilled out the rivet holding the swtich together, took off the cover and remvoed the contacts. I then fount that other substance well-known to classic computer types -- grease that turns to cement. Cleaned it off, cleanded thee contacts (well, while I had it apart) and resassmbled it. Now it clicked. And an ohmmeter showet it was woring electrically too. Put it all back together again. Now it will initialise and respond to the control paenl -- provided there's paper in it. Time to fit the printhead (trivial), and it now makes that well-known buzzing that everybody who's ever been near a dot-matrix printer would recognise. Will it print anyhting sensible? Well, let's try the ribbon. Which is jammed. The ribbon cartridge is heat-staked together, but the hold trick of pulling htr ribbon out and widing it back in got it free enough to work. Now the self-test prints a character set -- and it looks quite sensible, Tiem to try it with a computer. I grab my HPIB test set-up (HP71 + HPIL module + HP82169 HPIL-HPIB interface) and cable it all up. Set the printer address to 4 (yes, I used a PET in the old days...) type PRINTER IS 4 and then PRINT. The darn thing does a formfeed (!). Then try PRINT"0123456789". It prints "0000444488" andanotehr formfeed. Clearly the 2 least significat bits (bits 1 and 2 in HPIB terminology) weren't gettign through (an unconnected HPIB line is high, which corresponds to logic 0 on this bus). Hence the CR character was becoming a formfeed... Fortunately I'd picked an HPIB address where this wasn't a problem, I hoped the HP custom PHI HPIB chip hadn't failed. I disconnected the HPIB cabel from the HP82159 and removed the HPIB interface PCB together with the connector PCB and HPIB cable from the printer/And then did continuity checks from the free end of the HPIB cable to the pins on the 3448 buffer chips on the HPIB PCB. Fortuneately bits 1 and 2 were indeed open.And a few morre detaild test showed it was nothing more than dirty contacts on the H{PIB socket. A cotton bud and propn-2-ol cured that. And then it printed properly -- at last. The last job was to fit the cover and platten knob, which was trivial -- at least after everything else. -tony From cisin at xenosoft.com Thu Mar 4 15:21:08 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 13:21:08 -0800 (PST) Subject: percom data separator In-Reply-To: <4B8F875D.26445.901224@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4B8FCFA6.5030509@verizon.net> <4B8F875D.26445.901224@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20100304131604.V23413@shell.lmi.net> The Percom one came with a 1771 already plugged into it. I asked why - isn't that chip a little expensive to provide, if the customer already has one that they had to unplug to plug in the board? One Percom rep told me that they tested and selected "the best" of the 1771s and supplied it, rather than have the customer using the random quality one that they already had. A different Percom rep told me that it was because they expected a large percentage of their customers to "bugger up" the pins on their 1771 in the process of unplugging it. From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 4 15:59:03 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 04 Mar 2010 13:59:03 -0800 Subject: percom data separator In-Reply-To: <20100304131604.V23413@shell.lmi.net> References: <4B8FCFA6.5030509@verizon.net>, <4B8F875D.26445.901224@cclist.sydex.com>, <20100304131604.V23413@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4B8FBCA7.26939.1603BC0@cclist.sydex.com> On 4 Mar 2010 at 13:21, Fred Cisin wrote: > The Percom one came with a 1771 already plugged into it. > > I asked why - isn't that chip a little expensive to provide, if the > customer already has one that they had to unplug to plug in the board? > > One Percom rep told me that they tested and selected "the best" of the > 1771s and supplied it, rather than have the customer using the random > quality one that they already had. > > A different Percom rep told me that it was because they expected a > large percentage of their customers to "bugger up" the pins on their > 1771 in the process of unplugging it. http://tinyurl.com/yad868f is the installation manual. Apparently backward chips and bent pins were a problem. The cheap TI socket on the adapter didn't help things any. --Chuck From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Thu Mar 4 16:07:35 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 23:07:35 +0100 Subject: HP2631B printer In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Tony Duell > Verzonden: donderdag 4 maart 2010 21:33 > Aan: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Onderwerp: HP2631B printer > > You may rememebr that a few weeks ago I asked ofr help on the > encoder of an HP2631B printer. I've not sorted it all out, > and will describe what I did... > > The initial problem was a defective 2114 RAM (!) on the > procesosr board. > After replacign that, the printer rammed the carriage into > the side of the mechanmism, blowing the 2 motor driver > transistors and an overvoltage zenenr on the -20V line. > Furtehr tests showd there were no signals coming from the > shaft encoder on the carriage movement leadscrew. > > I took the machine apart. Really apart. Not having the > special tools to remove the encoder form the leadscrew, I > found I could take them out together, You loosen the cap > screw in the collar on the carriage motor shafter, free the > ribbon cable from the cips onthe rear paper guide, and tkae > out the 3 screws from the encoder mounting plate. The whole > lot this comes out of the right hand side of the mechamism. I > could then remove the end cover from the encoder (carring the > IR emitter) and the little cover over the cable connections. > > The HP service manual warns you not t oremove the carriage > rails or platten bar, since 'an important adjustment will be > upset'. I reckoned that my pritner was in a pretty bad state > already, and little could make it any worde, so I took it all > apart. I am wondering what the HP manaul is talking about. > The 2 carriage rails have their ends turned down to fit in > holes i nthe side plate, so theres no way they can be moved > by more than a few thou. And these ends are not eccentric, I > checked. The platten bar is locared by dowel pins to each > side plate. It can't move either. As far as I can see there > is no problem at all with completely stripping the mechanism. > This meant I could deal with that substance well-know to all > classic computer people -- sound-deadening foam that turns to dust. > > Back to the enconder. The person who said 'sounds like the IR > emitter is out' was vey close. The IR emitter was indeed not > glowing. The reason was that it's conencted to the rest of > the encoder by 2 little pin sockets on the emeltter assembly > (encoder end cover) which fit onto wires coming out of the > enocderr boddy -- one of them seems to be the end of a > current limiting resistor... Anyway, one of those wires was > bent and not connecting to the emitter assembly. Easy to fix > when you know where to look! > > I crelaced the shorted zneer diode on the PSU board, and did > some simple checks on the rest of the electronics. The DIP > switches on the priner logic PCB and HPIB conenctor PCB were > not reliable. Since an HPIB address swithc which doesn't set > the address you expect is going to be a curse, I replaced > them. I managed to re-stake the puchbutton assemblies on the > control panel PCB -- http://www.parts.agilent.com indicates > that type of switch (plastic housing heat-staked to a PCB > with gold contact pads) is still avaialbe, but only if you > return the instrument to Agilent for repair. Sorry, but no way... > > With everything back together (apart from the motor driver > transistors), it was time to give it a go. I could now see > that the encoder was producing pulses, that the end sensors > worked, and that it wasn't trying to turn on both motor > driver transsitors at the same time. Powered down, fitted the > (expensive, 25A) motor driver transistors, and tried again > with the lesdscrew nut unscrewed from the carriage. The idea > was that if the motor 'ran away', it wouldn't slam the > carriage into the side plate. > Tjhis time on power-up the mtoor ran -- but at a sensible > speed, there were plento of pulses from the encoder, and by > just touching the leadscrew nut I found it was indeed trying > to drive the carriage to the left. > > Time fore the real test. I ffittd the 3 screws holding the > leadscrew nut to the carriage, and tired again. The carriage > went to the home position, and the macjhine gave a long beep. > The frontpanel buttons did nothing apart from reset (which > repeated the initialisation) and On-Line which caused it to > beep again. I tried frobbing the paper-out switch, it made no > difference, so I guessed I had a real fault. > > I spend 2 hours looking at signals. The peocessor was clearly > running. > The end sensor signals were fine. The enocder, position > counters, direction flip-flop, and so on all seemed to be > doing the right things. I was beginning to think i had a > nasty fault in the custom HP procesosr chip. And yet, it was > running the firmware, at least enough to run the carriage to > the home position, sound the beeper, and so on. Checking what > the processor ws trying to do to the pritner logic PCB > indicated it was reading the sensors and writng to the > carriage motor register, which made sense. It wasn't > randoming acccessing all the ports. > > What had I missed? I went back to the paper out signal. It > was high (indicating out-of-paprr) at the input pin of the > 3-state buffer on the printer logic PCB. It was low on the > motor harness pin on the PSU board (that makes sense, there's > a NOT gate on the PSU board which inverts this sigal). But it > didn't change state when I frobbed the microswitch. > Aha... > > Although the microswitch is hidden inside the printer > mechanism, I managed to disconenct one of the faston > terminals from it (the switch is closed when out of paper). > This time when I powered the machine up, it homed the > carriage and didn't beep. I could do linefeeds and formfeeds > from the panel, the on-line button worked, and the self-test > seemed to be trying to print something (I'd not fitted the > printhead at this stage. > > So the microswtich was faulty. Strangely it was stuck closed > (most switch porblems cause them to not make contact). I > removed the printer mechanism again, turned it over, and > removed the rear paper guide (4 screws). 2 mores screws > released the microswitch from the guide. And it didn't > 'click' when I pressed the actuating lever. Unfortunately, > although it's a standard V3 size switch, the actuator is > unusual, so getting a replacement would be nnon-trivial. With > nothing to lose, I drilled out the rivet holding the swtich > together, took off the cover and remvoed the contacts. I then > fount that other substance well-known to classic computer > types -- grease that turns to cement. Cleaned it off, > cleanded thee contacts (well, while I had it apart) and > resassmbled it. Now it clicked. And an ohmmeter showet it was > woring electrically too. > > Put it all back together again. Now it will initialise and > respond to the control paenl -- provided there's paper in it. > Time to fit the printhead (trivial), and it now makes that > well-known buzzing that everybody who's ever been near a > dot-matrix printer would recognise. Will it print anyhting > sensible? Well, let's try the ribbon. Which is jammed. The > ribbon cartridge is heat-staked together, but the hold trick > of pulling htr ribbon out and widing it back in got it free > enough to work. Now the self-test prints a character set -- > and it looks quite sensible, > > Tiem to try it with a computer. I grab my HPIB test set-up > (HP71 + HPIL module + HP82169 HPIL-HPIB interface) and cable > it all up. Set the printer address to 4 (yes, I used a PET in > the old days...) type PRINTER IS 4 and then PRINT. The darn > thing does a formfeed (!). Then try PRINT"0123456789". It > prints "0000444488" andanotehr formfeed. Clearly the 2 least > significat bits (bits 1 and 2 in HPIB terminology) weren't > gettign through (an unconnected HPIB line is high, which > corresponds to logic 0 on this bus). Hence the CR character > was becoming a formfeed... > Fortunately I'd picked an HPIB address where this wasn't a problem, > > I hoped the HP custom PHI HPIB chip hadn't failed. I > disconnected the HPIB cabel from the HP82159 and removed the > HPIB interface PCB together with the connector PCB and HPIB > cable from the printer/And then did continuity checks from > the free end of the HPIB cable to the pins on the > 3448 buffer chips on the HPIB PCB. Fortuneately bits 1 and 2 > were indeed open.And a few morre detaild test showed it was > nothing more than dirty contacts on the H{PIB socket. A > cotton bud and propn-2-ol cured that. > > And then it printed properly -- at last. The last job was to > fit the cover and platten knob, which was trivial -- at least > after everything else. > > -tony > NICE work ! -Rik From cisin at xenosoft.com Thu Mar 4 16:54:17 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 14:54:17 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bootable Model III Disks... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100304141750.Y28701@shell.lmi.net> > > Nope, not gonna take it back. > > In my circle of users in Brooklyn, EVERYBODY with a Model I had a > > doubler if they had disk drives. EVERYBODY. On Thu, 4 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > It is extremely unscientific to stick to a statement when you have clear > evidence to the contrary. I haven't seen any clear evidence that he every hung out with anybody without a doubler, so his statement could be technically true. > This is a ninternational list. I qould guess there are many people here > (including mysef) who have never been to Brooklyn. But, if you ever do, apparently EVERYBODY in Brooklyn had a doubler. So, Brooklyn might be a good place to buy RS Expansion Interfaces. > > I'm sure there are people on this list who didn't. Because you guys > > can be pretty stubborn, ornery and non-standard. well, yeah. > > and had lots of trouble reading disks. Among the people that _I_ hung out with, everybody had already solved that long before the doubler became available. > This is soemthing I can't explain. I have a 'stock' M1 EI, using the > internal data separator of the 1771. I never had _any_ problems with it. > It read disks with no isseus at all. I had many more problems with the M3 > (first of all that infernal tapewire cable between the CPU board and the > disk controller board, and in fact I had to replace the 1793 chip in the > M3 at least once). Oh well... I wonder if there were any differences in the Expansion Interface, other than the power supply? Around here, there were lots of EI problems unrelated to the FDC. RS did a "free" "upgrade" of EIs to a "buffered cable" between the CPU and the EI, then did an "upgrade" to add an additional DIN cabel, then another "upgrade" which included switching back to an unbuffered cable. > As I said, I was seriously ocnsidering a Doubler, but finding an M3 at a > low price removed the need for it... a doubler was worth having, but there were other alternatives, including mutually incompatible other devices for the same connections. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From brad at heeltoe.com Thu Mar 4 18:56:26 2010 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Thu, 04 Mar 2010 19:56:26 -0500 Subject: Cayman GatorBox CS firmware update issues In-Reply-To: <61AAE489-6FF8-48C5-B192-5244A6361C1C@neurotica.com> (sfid-20100303_191954_332169_06AABB7C) References: <201002270653.02090.thrashbarg@kaput.homeunix.org> (sfid-20100226_154037_835584_90408C17) <649630E5-4483-4A08-9D8E-3AE0239B9EFA@heeltoe.com> <61AAE489-6FF8-48C5-B192-5244A6361C1C@neurotica.com> (sfid-20100303_191954_332169_06AABB7C) Message-ID: <4B9056BA.80307@heeltoe.com> Dave McGuire wrote: > > You wrote that firmware? Cool! I've had quite a few of those boxes > go through my hands. I might even have one or two left in storage. > They were always great boxes. I and many other. I wrote a lot of the original code, and most of the routers. But I had a lot smart people helping. Mostly I added bugs :-) The upgrade software for the CS was always a little on the complex side. I would have made it a lot "simpler" if I had had more time. It was our first "flash based" product and the requirement was that you could upgrade remotely, which made things more complex. As I recall the "upgrade mode" code was almost the full appetalk stack and router. -brad From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 4 22:24:36 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2010 22:24:36 -0600 Subject: here's one i've never heard of Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003042024o693aea11ra4d63a64bded0b2a@mail.gmail.com> It's Z80 so it's just slightly before my time. But I thought you guys would be interested. It looks really clean. http://cgi.ebay.com/Vintage-Computer-Ibex-Z80-64k-Console-Terminal-RARE-80_W0QQitemZ290409966853QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item439dc86d05 brian From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 4 22:53:28 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 04 Mar 2010 20:53:28 -0800 Subject: here's one i've never heard of In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003042024o693aea11ra4d63a64bded0b2a@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003042024o693aea11ra4d63a64bded0b2a@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B901DC8.15425.200DEE@cclist.sydex.com> On 4 Mar 2010 at 22:24, Brian Lanning wrote: > It's Z80 so it's just slightly before my time. But I thought you guys > would be interested. It looks really clean. About 1977-82, tasteful earthtones. Z80A CPU, runs CP/M. Made in Japan and marketed in the US by Martec International for Marubeni Electronics Co. in Japan. Martec is now Marubeni Solutions- USA: http://www.msol-usa.com/profile.html Some of these Ibex systems were multi-user, but I'm not sure that this is one of them. --Chuck From wh.sudbrink at verizon.net Fri Mar 5 08:28:49 2010 From: wh.sudbrink at verizon.net (Bill Sudbrink) Date: Fri, 05 Mar 2010 09:28:49 -0500 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... Message-ID: I rewired the transformer per Pete and Tony (thanks guys!) and replaced all of the electrolytic caps in the power supply. Looking at the Sorcerer One schematics and confirmed on the board, there is a big 10-watt resistor across the +5 regulator like the Altair 680 PS so I tested with the dummy load I made for the 680. All voltages were spot-on. Close examination of the logic board didn't show anything that looked bad so I hooked up a small LCD test display, held my breath and turned it on. I assumed I would get a screen full of garbage if anything, but it turns out the little display can detect and show PAL. The Sorcerer is up 100 percent. The RAM/stack report in the monitor start message indicates that the full 48K is there. I did some random poking around and the RAM looks basically functional. With my luck running this good, I went ahead and powered down and inserted the BASIC "8-track" ROM cartridge. Powered back up and there was Standard BASIC, fully operational. So, it looks like I have a lot less to do with this machine than I thought. I do want to convert the unit back to NTSC and I have not tested the serial or cassette ports though. Anyway, I'm going to do some cosmetics next. The keyboard is filthy, so a disassembly and wash is in order. Next, most of the perforated metal ventilation panels have fallen out. I have them all. It looks like they were glued in place with hot-melt glue. Is that how they were originally attached? Bill From pete at dunnington.plus.com Fri Mar 5 10:08:53 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Fri, 05 Mar 2010 16:08:53 +0000 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B912C95.7000007@dunnington.plus.com> On 05/03/2010 14:28, Bill Sudbrink wrote: > So, it looks like I have a lot less to do with this machine than > I thought. I do want to convert the unit back to NTSC and I > have not tested the serial or cassette ports though. It looks like you have a good machine :-) The serial and cassette ports are pretty reliable. You might want to tweak the PLL setting for the cassette; it's described in the Tech Manual, but isn't often needed. I found with both of mine, and a variety of cassette recorders, that an attenuator was useful -- that's just a voltage divider made up of two resistors and built in to one of the plugs. Again, there's an example in the Tech Manual. > Anyway, I'm going to do some cosmetics next. The keyboard is > filthy, so a disassembly and wash is in order. You should be able to remove the keytops easily by pulling them straight up, preferably with a keytop puller. My favoured system is then to drop them in a small bucket with a little floor cleaner (=low foam detergent) in warm water and swish them about a bit; I drain them off and wipe them with a cloth with a very small amount of furniture polish. When I'm feeling lazier, I put them in a pillowcase, give a /short/ spray of polish (while they're still wet), tie up the top, and drop them in the tumble drier on a cool setting (often with other household articles). The keys themselves are of the sprung gold-plated type similar to some DEC VT-series terminals, and they're good quality. A small paintbrush and a vacuum cleaner will remove any debris from around them, and the most you'd want to do with the contacts is blow some canned air in (not too violently) to dislodge any dust. > Next, most of the > perforated metal ventilation panels have fallen out. I have them > all. It looks like they were glued in place with hot-melt glue. > Is that how they were originally attached? If it wasn't actually hot-melt glue, it was obviously something very similar. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From cclist at sydex.com Fri Mar 5 10:49:02 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 05 Mar 2010 08:49:02 -0800 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <4B912C95.7000007@dunnington.plus.com> References: , <4B912C95.7000007@dunnington.plus.com> Message-ID: <4B90C57E.11113.3BC842@cclist.sydex.com> On 5 Mar 2010 at 16:08, Pete Turnbull wrote: > If it wasn't actually hot-melt glue, it was obviously something very > similar. Perhaps another good application for polyurethane (i.e. Gorilla) glue? ;) --Chuck From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 5 15:11:51 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 21:11:51 +0000 (GMT) Subject: percom data separator In-Reply-To: <20100304131604.V23413@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Mar 4, 10 01:21:08 pm Message-ID: > > The Percom one came with a 1771 already plugged into it. > > I asked why - isn't that chip a little expensive to provide, if the > customer already has one that they had to unplug to plug in the board? I am pretty sure the Radio Shack doubler came without the 1771 -- you fitted the one that you had removed from the EI. Of course you were supposed to have a Radio Shack service centre fit it, but I don't think you had to (at least ont over here, I ordered a couple of upgrades for other machines (like an extended color basic ROM for the CoCo) and fitted them myself). I think I;'d have been darn annoyed if I'd bought a doubler and ended up with a redundant 1771. It was a rather expensive device... > > One Percom rep told me that they tested and selected "the best" of the > 1771s and supplied it, rather than have the customer using the random > quality one that they already had. And what, pray tell, did Percom do with all those 1771s that didn't pass these tests? > > A different Percom rep told me that it was because they expected a large > percentage of their customers to "bugger up" the pins on their 1771 in the > process of unplugging it. And people who couldn't remove a 40 pin socketed chip without mangling it were surely not likely to make a good job of fitting the doubler board with all the pins correctly aligned wit hthe socket. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 5 15:15:44 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 21:15:44 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP2631B printer In-Reply-To: from "Rik Bos" at Mar 4, 10 11:07:35 pm Message-ID: > NICE work ! I am glad you liked it. I may well post other 'repair stories' if I consider them to bne interesting enough (i.e. mroe than replacing a trivially obvious componnent). At least until I get flamed for it :-) Anyway, note that there was no board-swapping, and no random changes. As I said, I spent most of the time looking at signals and working out what was going on, not changing things. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 5 15:25:15 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 21:25:15 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Bootable Model III Disks... In-Reply-To: <20100304141750.Y28701@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Mar 4, 10 02:54:17 pm Message-ID: > > > > Nope, not gonna take it back. > > > In my circle of users in Brooklyn, EVERYBODY with a Model I had a > > > doubler if they had disk drives. EVERYBODY. > > On Thu, 4 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > > It is extremely unscientific to stick to a statement when you have clear > > evidence to the contrary. > > I haven't seen any clear evidence that he every hung out with anybody > without a doubler, so his statement could be technically true. Oh, I am quite happy to accept that all the people he assoiciated with back then who had M1s had doublers. But that was not the original statement. > > > > and had lots of trouble reading disks. > > Among the people that _I_ hung out with, everybody had already solved that > long before the doubler became available. > > > > This is soemthing I can't explain. I have a 'stock' M1 EI, using the > > internal data separator of the 1771. I never had _any_ problems with it. > > It read disks with no isseus at all. I had many more problems with the M3 > > (first of all that infernal tapewire cable between the CPU board and the > > disk controller board, and in fact I had to replace the 1793 chip in the > > M3 at least once). Oh well... > > I wonder if there were any differences in the Expansion Interface, other > than the power supply? AFAIK it's not the PSU that changed, not even between the European and US models. THey all rand off the same type of 'brick' as the M1 keyboard/CPU unit. You could fit the 2 bricks inside the EI to save space, the European ones were larger (and in metal cases) so you had to dismantle the case and remvoe a redundant plastic tray to do this. Who cares about the warranty anyway :-) > > Around here, there were lots of EI problems unrelated to the FDC. > > RS did a "free" "upgrade" of EIs to a "buffered cable" between the CPU and > the EI, then did an "upgrade" to add an additional DIN cabel, then another > "upgrade" which included switching back to an unbuffered cable. This all relates to the DRAM timiog. The DRAM system needs 3 accurately timed signals, RAS/, cAS/ and Mux (this being the control input to the address multiplexer). They are all produced and used on the M1 processor board for the intenral DRAM. ANd they were brought out to the expansion connector. The original intention was to feed those along a ribbon cable to the EI. This AFAIK never worked propperly. The next idea was to fit a buffer PCB in the calbe ot clean up those signals. Then to use a screned DIN cable to carry them. And findally to only use the RAS/ signal from the M1 CPU board and to geenrate the other 2 signals inside the EI using a delay line. My EI is one of the last design. I have just dug out the scheamtics that came with it, and from waht I can see there were no changes to the disk cotnroller section. Thre is no external data separator, the XTDS/ pin of the 1771 is pulled high (this pin is low if you have an external data separator and high to use the one built into the 1771 I think). -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 5 15:38:35 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 21:38:35 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: from "Bill Sudbrink" at Mar 5, 10 09:28:49 am Message-ID: > So, it looks like I have a lot less to do with this machine than > I thought. I do want to convert the unit back to NTSC and I > have not tested the serial or cassette ports though. Since the machine is basically working, it shouldn't be too hard to sort out any problems with these interfaces. You have enough oerking to be able to write values ot the interface ports and see what happens... > > Anyway, I'm going to do some cosmetics next. The keyboard is > filthy, so a disassembly and wash is in order. Next, most of the If you remove the keycaps (and IIRC they just pull off), make a diagram before you start. So you don't have to send out the sort of message I sent out once when restoring an HO9185 (the keys on that fall out when you remove the PCB...) -- 'Can somebody please tell be the order of the keys in the first 2 rows of the keybard'. :-) I normally use graph paper for this. I draw the key positions approximsately using either 1cm or 1/2" squares for each normal-size key.. 'Aproximately' means I tesnd offset the rows of the QWERTY section by hald a key width for each row, rather htan the exact ammount. It's clear enough. And then I writei n each 'box' on hthe graph paper the markings on the key. After I've completed the cleaning, I file that sheet in the service manual for the machine for next time I have to do a repair. > perforated metal ventilation panels have fallen out. I have them > all. It looks like they were glued in place with hot-melt glue. > Is that how they were originally attached? I can't remember,but the reason I am replying here is that I have an intense distrust of glues. If it were my machine, I would drill small holes and use nuts and bols (M3 over here, I guess 4-40 is about right too) to hold the grilles in place. It may not be originial, but I am not running a museum, I run the machines :-). And I don't want metal objects floating around inside... -tony From silent700 at gmail.com Fri Mar 5 16:13:54 2010 From: silent700 at gmail.com (Jason T) Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 16:13:54 -0600 Subject: here's one i've never heard of In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003042024o693aea11ra4d63a64bded0b2a@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003042024o693aea11ra4d63a64bded0b2a@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <51ea77731003051413q653e1454kb190789580f23bea@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 4, 2010 at 10:24 PM, Brian Lanning wrote: > It's Z80 so it's just slightly before my time. ?But I thought you guys would > be interested. ?It looks really clean. > > http://cgi.ebay.com/Vintage-Computer-Ibex-Z80-64k-Console-Terminal-RARE-80_W0QQitemZ290409966853QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item439dc86d05 I was watching that one too :) Too far away to ship, though. Here's an ad for one: http://books.google.com/books?id=HjAEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA55&ots=0u_MjRCeTP&dq=ibex%20z80&pg=PA55#v=onepage&q=ibex%20z80&f=false As an aside, does anyone know why that 1982 issue of InfoWorld can be accessed directly (as a result of a search) but when browsing their archives, it only goes back to 1986? Books.Google is putting a lot of great stuff online now. From cisin at xenosoft.com Fri Mar 5 18:14:20 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 16:14:20 -0800 (PST) Subject: percom data separator In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100305161251.N74100@shell.lmi.net> > > One Percom rep told me that they tested and selected "the best" of the > > 1771s and supplied it, rather than have the customer using the random > > quality one that they already had. On Fri, 5 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > And what, pray tell, did Percom do with all those 1771s that didn't pass > these tests? Sell them to Tandy? From cisin at xenosoft.com Fri Mar 5 18:17:06 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 16:17:06 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100305161538.C74100@shell.lmi.net> On Fri, 5 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > I can't remember,but the reason I am replying here is that I have an > intense distrust of glues. If it were my machine, I would drill small > holes and use nuts and bols (M3 over here, I guess 4-40 is about right > too) to hold the grilles in place. It may not be originial, but I am not > running a museum, I run the machines :-). And I don't want metal objects > floating around inside... . . . such as M3 nuts? From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Mar 5 18:26:49 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Fri, 05 Mar 2010 17:26:49 -0700 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <20100305161538.C74100@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100305161538.C74100@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4B91A149.2040503@jetnet.ab.ca> Fred Cisin wrote: > On Fri, 5 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: >> I can't remember,but the reason I am replying here is that I have an >> intense distrust of glues. If it were my machine, I would drill small >> holes and use nuts and bols (M3 over here, I guess 4-40 is about right >> too) to hold the grilles in place. It may not be originial, but I am not >> running a museum, I run the machines :-). And I don't want metal objects >> floating around inside... > > . . . such as M3 nuts? Would T-Nut s work in a case like this? Ben. From cclist at sydex.com Fri Mar 5 20:35:50 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 05 Mar 2010 18:35:50 -0800 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: References: from "Bill Sudbrink" at Mar 5, 10 09:28:49 am, Message-ID: <4B914F06.27263.25529A8@cclist.sydex.com> On 5 Mar 2010 at 21:38, Tony Duell wrote: > I can't remember,but the reason I am replying here is that I have an > intense distrust of glues... Try some polyurethane glue ("Gorilla glue"). I use it to tack down components when needed. It'll even tack a cable to a steel frame. Great for repairing pottery--it expands to fill gaps and makes a watertight seal. Yet it's easy enough to trim off with a utility knife. The only serious drawback to it is the long (i.e. 24 hour) cure time, meaning you have to keep whatever you're gluing clamped or tacked in place until the glue cures. I can't recommend it highly enough. --Chuck From spectre at floodgap.com Fri Mar 5 21:10:36 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 19:10:36 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <4B914F06.27263.25529A8@cclist.sydex.com> from Chuck Guzis at "Mar 5, 10 06:35:50 pm" Message-ID: <201003060310.o263AaKS012784@floodgap.com> > > I can't remember,but the reason I am replying here is that I have an > > intense distrust of glues... > > Try some polyurethane glue ("Gorilla glue"). I use it to tack down > components when needed. It'll even tack a cable to a steel frame. > Great for repairing pottery--it expands to fill gaps and makes a > watertight seal. Yet it's easy enough to trim off with a utility > knife. The only serious drawback to it is the long (i.e. 24 hour) > cure time, meaning you have to keep whatever you're gluing clamped or > tacked in place until the glue cures. And if it gets on your hands .... well, it don't come off. Don't ask how I found this out. That said, I rebuilt my dinette set with it. With gloves, this time. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Math according to Pentium: 2 / 2 = 1.037587439439485486372112039523781385 ... From doc at vaxen.net Fri Mar 5 23:17:53 2010 From: doc at vaxen.net (Doc) Date: Fri, 05 Mar 2010 23:17:53 -0600 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <4B914F06.27263.25529A8@cclist.sydex.com> References: from "Bill Sudbrink" at Mar 5, 10 09:28:49 am, <4B914F06.27263.25529A8@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B91E581.8000608@vaxen.net> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 5 Mar 2010 at 21:38, Tony Duell wrote: > >> I can't remember,but the reason I am replying here is that I have an >> intense distrust of glues... > > Try some polyurethane glue ("Gorilla glue"). I use it to tack down > components when needed. It'll even tack a cable to a steel frame. > Great for repairing pottery--it expands to fill gaps and makes a > watertight seal. Yet it's easy enough to trim off with a utility > knife. The only serious drawback to it is the long (i.e. 24 hour) > cure time, meaning you have to keep whatever you're gluing clamped or > tacked in place until the glue cures. > > I can't recommend it highly enough. There are a couple of threads on the bladeforums.com knife-maker forum titled "Glue Wars ". Lots of adhesives got put through some serious destructive testing in those threads, and Gorilla Glue is either the winner or tied with Brownell's Epoxy, depending on your criteria. I still prefer Brownell's simply because it has more historical data than polyurethanes, but Gorilla Glue is undeniably easier to use and it is some incredibly Tough Stuff(tm). Doc From cclist at sydex.com Sat Mar 6 00:38:38 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 05 Mar 2010 22:38:38 -0800 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <4B91E581.8000608@vaxen.net> References: , <4B914F06.27263.25529A8@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B91E581.8000608@vaxen.net> Message-ID: <4B9187EE.5029.3337177@cclist.sydex.com> On 5 Mar 2010 at 23:17, Doc wrote: > There are a couple of threads on the bladeforums.com knife-maker > forum titled "Glue Wars ". Lots of adhesives got put through > some serious destructive testing in those threads, and Gorilla Glue is > either the winner or tied with Brownell's Epoxy, depending on your > criteria. That's surprising. I would have thought that one of the ScotchWeld industrial epoxies from 3M would have been the hands-down winner. I guess there's better stuff out there--but I'm not about to toss my supply. --Chuck From ukarmansalok at gmail.com Thu Mar 4 08:12:19 2010 From: ukarmansalok at gmail.com (Ukarman Salok) Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 01:12:19 +1100 Subject: Apple Lisa 1 for sale Message-ID: <251b5c981003040612x3c6d14xbe69e36a62b5acae@mail.gmail.com> Hi, Are you still selling this? Thankyou From henk.gooijen at hotmail.com Sat Mar 6 04:18:56 2010 From: henk.gooijen at hotmail.com (Henk Gooijen) Date: Sat, 6 Mar 2010 11:18:56 +0100 Subject: HP2631B printer In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: >> NICE work ! > > I am glad you liked it. I may well post other 'repair stories' if I > consider them to bne interesting enough (i.e. mroe than replacing a > trivially obvious componnent). At least until I get flamed for it :-) Please post repair story Tony. I enjoyed reading it, and it gives me the feeling that there are people that actually "think through" the hardware to get the puzzle solved. You nicely told how to got to the solution, and showed us that in the end it often comes down to simple things. > Anyway, note that there was no board-swapping, and no random > changes. As I said, I spent most of the time looking at signals > and working out what was going on, not changing things. :-) Yes that was clear, and it only shows more clearly that using brains is the most important tool. Looking forward to read a new story to learn from. - Henk. From shumaker at att.net Sat Mar 6 08:51:01 2010 From: shumaker at att.net (steve shumaker) Date: Sat, 06 Mar 2010 09:51:01 -0500 Subject: vintage equip F/S in CA Message-ID: <4B926BD5.3070000@att.net> A California Craigs List ad earlier this week caught my eye a couple days ago and some emailing with the seller resulted in the following: ************************************** Bear in mind that Gary was describing things and sometimes I don't get the jargo quite right. OK I have the info that you might like. We have a bunch of Kaypros as mentioned and they are all the same $60 except the 16 which is $125 Kaypro- 2 Kaypro2 - 6 Kaypro4 5 Kaypro10 1 Kaypro 16- in original box with everything Kaypro daisy wheel printer Kaypro pc Heathkit 89 A 2- one with dual floppy , Heath buss, Serial IO card, fan One with single floppy, and a CPU and memory main. We also have one H8 some missing memory chips and much documentation. We are asking $250 for H8 We have a printer buffer as well for that with the manuals, cords etc. Happy to include with it. I took some photos of the bunch of computers in the storage and will send some to you if you wish. However, I have a crummy photo editor and it requires a different email for each photo if I want to send them in a small size. Now, I am planning on listing the H8 in the next couple of weeks on ebay unless someone is serious enough to come up and buy it. We are closing our storage space in the next month or two and really want to see the big computers etc translated into money.. ***************************************************** They added more info today: ***************************************************** As for other stuff, it is a big list, I have over 100 assorted vintage computers (No, no Altairs and only one slightly munched IMSAI front panel). Partial list w/o S-100, Heath, Zenith, Kaypros or Osbornes: 3 each- TI99/4 2 each - TRS-80 Olivetti M15 Apple II Apple IIC Apple IIE Apple Monitor 3 each - Apple Mac (Cube) SE Apple Mac Wyse Video Terminal 2 each - Dual 8" floppy subsystems (Lobo and similar) NEC APC with built in color monitor and dual 8" floppies (seriously cool) NEC APC III with dual 5" floppies and separate color monitor. 2 each - Amiga 500 systems in box SWTPC 6800 Olivetti M-700-10 5 each - Compaq plasma lunch box ASR-33 teletype with paper tape and stand (very clean). Lots of old Monitors. ****************************************************** Units are being sold by a collector who has apprently been collecting since the 2nd West Coat Computer Fair and who is doing some house cleaning They have stated they will put them on Ebay soon but are willing to sell direct to interested collectors... Equipment is physically located in Ft Bragg, CA. contact info is "Barbara McCray" DISCLAIMER: FWIW, I know nothing of the seller or the equipment. She did mention that she sells on Ebay as "Dichroicarts". She is aware that I'm posting this info so if you're interested, go direct! steve From Arno_1983 at gmx.de Sat Mar 6 10:57:55 2010 From: Arno_1983 at gmx.de (Arno Kletzander) Date: Sat, 06 Mar 2010 17:57:55 +0100 Subject: HP2631B printer Message-ID: <20100306165755.130000@gmx.net> Rik Bos wrote: (concerning The Adventures of Fabulous Tony with the Dot Matrix Printer): > NICE work ! I'd also like to congratulate to that successful bug hunting and squishing operation and utter my appreciation for its thorough description but... I think that's possible to do without quoting that whole lot ;) So long, Arno -- GMX DSL: Internet, Telefon und Entertainment f?r nur 19,99 EUR/mtl.! http://portal.gmx.net/de/go/dsl02 From cclist at sydex.com Sat Mar 6 11:07:24 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sat, 06 Mar 2010 09:07:24 -0800 Subject: ISO: Information on Fairchild/Schlumberger EXA 3000 Message-ID: <4B921B4C.13135.475059@cclist.sydex.com> Does anyone out there have information on the disk subsystem of the Fairchild/Schlumberger EXA 3000 tester? I think I've got it figured out, but some validation would come in useful. Thanks, Chuck From alhartman at yahoo.com Sat Mar 6 12:21:51 2010 From: alhartman at yahoo.com (Al Hartman) Date: Sat, 6 Mar 2010 10:21:51 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <805856.46575.qm@web55307.mail.re4.yahoo.com> Rather than drawing a disgram of the keycaps, wouldn't a picture taken by a digital or polaroid camera be easier and faster? Al From js at cimmeri.com Sat Mar 6 12:39:15 2010 From: js at cimmeri.com (js at cimmeri.com) Date: Sat, 06 Mar 2010 13:39:15 -0500 Subject: Anyone running RTE-M on an HP 21MX series M, E, or F? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B92A153.6000408@cimmeri.com> Hi. I'm curious if anyone's got RTE-M booting from mini-cartridge (such as 2645A terminal) or 8" floppy (such as 9885M) for their HP 1000 21MX (eg. 2113E). I'm attempting restoration of a 2113E with the extremely kind assistance of J. David Bryan, and would love to find a bootable primary copy. It would also be great to hear what OSes folks are running on these, and which version they like the best. Thanks very much, John Singleton Rockville, MD. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 6 12:31:38 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 6 Mar 2010 18:31:38 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <20100305161538.C74100@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Mar 5, 10 04:17:06 pm Message-ID: > > On Fri, 5 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > > I can't remember,but the reason I am replying here is that I have an > > intense distrust of glues. If it were my machine, I would drill small My dislike of glues is 2-fold. Firstly they tend to come apart when you don't want them to, and secondly they are difficult to undo (without damage) if you do need to get the thign apart again. > > holes and use nuts and bolts (M3 over here, I guess 4-40 is about right > > too) to hold the grilles in place. It may not be originial, but I am not > > running a museum, I run the machines :-). And I don't want metal objects > > floating around inside... > > . . . such as M3 nuts? Who said anything about metal nuts? There are nylon (or even ceramic) ones avaialble. In any case, there are ways of preventing them working loose. Shakeproof washers, self-locking ('Nyloc') nuts, threadlock adhesives [1] (Loctite make some nice ones..), lock-nutting (tightening 2 nuts against each other), and that's just the ones I can think of off the top of my head. [1] If you pick the right type, it will hold, and you can undo it without damage later, so my main objections to glues don't apply. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 6 12:37:39 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 6 Mar 2010 18:37:39 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <4B914F06.27263.25529A8@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 5, 10 06:35:50 pm Message-ID: > > On 5 Mar 2010 at 21:38, Tony Duell wrote: > > > I can't remember,but the reason I am replying here is that I have an > > intense distrust of glues... > > Try some polyurethane glue ("Gorilla glue"). I use it to tack down > components when needed. It'll even tack a cable to a steel frame. How fo yuo udno it again if you need to replace either part? There are glues I use with success. The plastic solvent-welding tpye of adhesives are good (provided you use them on a plastic they will disolve). I use the well-known trick of strengthing the repair on the back with some cotton fabric. Epoxy adhesives are useful too for all sorts of repairs. I've never had much success with isocyano acrylic hydro-copolymerising adhesives, though. And contact adhesive is what I sue for sticking on nameplates, bits of trim, and that sort of thing. But only if I know I am not going to want to take it off again ever, for any reason. Certainly for anything I make myself, I never use adhesives, I alsways use screws.. > Great for repairing pottery--it expands to fill gaps and makes a > watertight seal. Yet it's easy enough to trim off with a utility > knife. The only serious drawback to it is the long (i.e. 24 hour) > cure time, meaning you have to keep whatever you're gluing clamped or > tacked in place until the glue cures. > > I can't recommend it highly enough. I think I should invest in some anyway... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 6 12:42:55 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 6 Mar 2010 18:42:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP2631B printer In-Reply-To: from "Henk Gooijen" at Mar 6, 10 11:18:56 am Message-ID: > > >> NICE work ! > > > > I am glad you liked it. I may well post other 'repair stories' if I > > consider them to bne interesting enough (i.e. mroe than replacing a > > trivially obvious componnent). At least until I get flamed for it :-) > > Please post repair story Tony. I enjoyed reading it, and it gives me > the feeling that there are people that actually "think through" the I am convinced (and it will take a lot to unconvince met) that htis is the only way to solve _any_ such problem. Making changes essentially at random never seems to help. > hardware to get the puzzle solved. You nicely told how to got to > the solution, and showed us that in the end it often comes down > to simple things. Err, yes... If I'd been more of a beginner, I'd probably have started by testign those components I could easily test (like switches) and would have foudn the fault in no time :-). But anyway... > > > Anyway, note that there was no board-swapping, and no random > > changes. As I said, I spent most of the time looking at signals > > and working out what was going on, not changing things. > > :-) Yes that was clear, and it only shows more clearly that using > brains is the most important tool. I am sure we all know here that there's no magic box you can connect to a defective defice and which says 'The 1k resistor at location R10 is too high'. but an amazing number of non-technical people seem to think there is. All the test equipment in the world won't help you find the fault unless you use it and interpret the results intellegently. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 6 12:48:25 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 6 Mar 2010 18:48:25 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <805856.46575.qm@web55307.mail.re4.yahoo.com> from "Al Hartman" at Mar 6, 10 10:21:51 am Message-ID: > > Rather than drawing a disgram of the keycaps, wouldn't a picture > taken by a digital or polaroid camera be easier and faster? Yes, it probably would. But a polaroid print is fairly small (makes it harder to see just what cap goes where), and I don't have a digital camera. Darwing the layout by hand only take a few minutes, anyhow. -tony From cclist at sydex.com Sat Mar 6 14:45:47 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sat, 06 Mar 2010 12:45:47 -0800 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: References: <4B914F06.27263.25529A8@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 5, 10 06:35:50 pm, Message-ID: <4B924E7B.23267.10F3DBE@cclist.sydex.com> On 6 Mar 2010 at 18:37, Tony Duell wrote: > How fo yuo udno it again if you need to replace either part? Just slide a knife in the joint; it scrapes off quite easily. Unlike most film-bonding glues (such as methacrylate glues), the strength comes from the polyurethane itself and its gap-filling properties (with wood, it's stainable). Think of it as very dense urethane foam. You must have used the low-density aerosol version to weatherize your home. > There are glues I use with success. The plastic solvent-welding tpye > of adhesives are good (provided you use them on a plastic they will > disolve). I don't consider those (e.g. methyl chloride) to be adhesives, so much as solvents. I've done lots of repairs with those and they're quite valuable and lead to a joint that's indistinguishable from the material itself. I've also been known to repair missing plastic pieces with automotive body filler (e.g. Bondo). A coat of paint and you can't tell that it's there. I use the well-known trick of strengthing the repair on the > back with some cotton fabric. I use the fiberglass tape that's used for sheetrock joints or laminating up resin structures. Much stronger than cotton. The driver's side kick panel on my Volvo brick has a long crack repaired with that and heavy-body ABS cement. It'll probably still be holding long after the rest of the car falls to pieces. > Epoxy adhesives are useful too for all sorts of repairs. I've never > had much success with isocyano acrylic hydro-copolymerising adhesives, > though. And contact adhesive is what I sue for sticking on nameplates, > bits of trim, and that sort of thing. I keep a couple of aerosol cans of Scotch Super 77 around for just that situation, in addition to being downright handy for gluing mailing labels onto boxes. Cheers, Chuck From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Sat Mar 6 18:29:35 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sun, 07 Mar 2010 00:29:35 +0000 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <4B924E7B.23267.10F3DBE@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4B914F06.27263.25529A8@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 5, 10 06:35:50 pm, <4B924E7B.23267.10F3DBE@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B92F36F.8030308@philpem.me.uk> Chuck Guzis wrote: > I keep a couple of aerosol cans of Scotch Super 77 around for just > that situation, in addition to being downright handy for gluing > mailing labels onto boxes. Is that anything like 3M Spraymount / Photo-Mount, or am I thinking of something else entirely? I've got a couple of cans of that stuff in the cupboard -- dead handy for doing front panels. Print a front panel overlay (mirrored) onto the back of a sheet of acetate, then spray with Photo-Mount and glue onto the panel. Cut around the edge with a sharp knife. Looks pretty nice if you do a good job of cleaning the panel beforehand, and get the overlay placed right first time. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From cclist at sydex.com Sat Mar 6 20:06:57 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sat, 06 Mar 2010 18:06:57 -0800 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <4B92F36F.8030308@philpem.me.uk> References: <4B914F06.27263.25529A8@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B924E7B.23267.10F3DBE@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B92F36F.8030308@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4B9299C1.11228.23545D6@cclist.sydex.com> On 7 Mar 2010 at 0:29, Philip Pemberton wrote: > Chuck Guzis wrote: > > I keep a couple of aerosol cans of Scotch Super 77 around for just > > that situation, in addition to being downright handy for gluing > > mailing labels onto boxes. > > Is that anything like 3M Spraymount / Photo-Mount, or am I thinking of > something else entirely? I don't know--it sounds similar. Here's the relevant web page: http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3M/en_US/3M-Super-77/Super77/ --Chuck From chrise at pobox.com Sat Mar 6 13:14:54 2010 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Sat, 6 Mar 2010 13:14:54 -0600 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: References: <4B914F06.27263.25529A8@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20100306191454.GB6342@n0jcf.net> On Saturday (03/06/2010 at 06:37PM +0000), Tony Duell wrote: > > There are glues I use with success. The plastic solvent-welding tpye of > adhesives are good (provided you use them on a plastic they will > disolve). I use the well-known trick of strengthing the repair on the > back with some cotton fabric. > > Epoxy adhesives are useful too for all sorts of repairs. I've never had > much success with isocyano acrylic hydro-copolymerising adhesives, > though. And contact adhesive is what I sue for sticking on nameplates, > bits of trim, and that sort of thing. I had good success recently repairing the (very old) clear plastic on the lid of a Teletype model 33. I was concerned that due to the age of the plastic, most any solvent based adhesive would at the least fog it and at the worst, dissolve it. I used this water soluable, latex based adhesive, http://www.loctiteproducts.com/products/detail.asp%3fcatid=17&subid=245&plid=879 and it worked wonderfully. Dries perfectly clear and Did No Harm(tm) to the old plastic. Chris -- Chris Elmquist From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Sun Mar 7 09:31:41 2010 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Sun, 7 Mar 2010 16:31:41 +0100 (CET) Subject: Anyone running RTE-M on an HP 21MX series M, E, or F? In-Reply-To: <4B92A153.6000408@cimmeri.com> References: <4B92A153.6000408@cimmeri.com> Message-ID: On Sat, 6 Mar 2010, js at cimmeri.com wrote: > Hi. I'm curious if anyone's got RTE-M booting from mini-cartridge (such as > 2645A terminal) or 8" floppy (such as 9885M) for their HP 1000 21MX (eg. > 2113E). [...] > It would also be great to hear what OSes folks are running on these, and > which version they like the best. Hm, I've never tried RTE-M, although I have rev. 2140 on magtape. Instead, I prefer RTE-6/VM on the 1000F. I have a setup with a 7905 (shared in a multi-cpu configuration with a HP 2100S), a 7970B, a 7970E, a 9122C, a 7958B (system disk), 2648 on a BACI and a terminal server on all the ports of an 8-channel MUX. Lovely system, and very different from most modern stuff. And the 2100S runs RTE-II from the fixed platter of the 7905. > I'm attempting restoration of a 2113E with the extremely kind assistance of > J. David Bryan, and would love to find a bootable primary copy. Simh has proved to be very useful especially when generating a new system. Christian From dkelvey at hotmail.com Sun Mar 7 12:05:05 2010 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Sun, 7 Mar 2010 10:05:05 -0800 Subject: Anyone running RTE-M on an HP 21MX series M, E, or F? In-Reply-To: References: , <4B92A153.6000408@cimmeri.com>, Message-ID: > From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de > > On Sat, 6 Mar 2010, js at cimmeri.com wrote: > > Hi. I'm curious if anyone's got RTE-M booting from mini-cartridge (such as > > 2645A terminal) or 8" floppy (such as 9885M) for their HP 1000 21MX (eg. > > 2113E). > [...] > > It would also be great to hear what OSes folks are running on these, and > > which version they like the best. > > Hm, I've never tried RTE-M, although I have rev. 2140 on magtape. Instead, > I prefer RTE-6/VM on the 1000F. I have a setup with a 7905 (shared in a > multi-cpu configuration with a HP 2100S), a 7970B, a 7970E, a 9122C, a > 7958B (system disk), 2648 on a BACI and a terminal server on all the ports > of an 8-channel MUX. Lovely system, and very different from most modern > stuff. > And the 2100S runs RTE-II from the fixed platter of the 7905. > > > I'm attempting restoration of a 2113E with the extremely kind assistance of > > J. David Bryan, and would love to find a bootable primary copy. > > Simh has proved to be very useful especially when generating a new system. > > Christian Hi I have a 2113E myself that is woriking but I have no peripherals. I just got a HP-IB board for it recently but I'll need something to connect to it. There is a drive on ebay right now but I'll not be around for the couple weeks so I'll need to wait for another. I figure the HP-IB is the easiest option for mass storeage. I'll most likely need to write a driver but I can do that. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ Your E-mail and More On-the-Go. Get Windows Live Hotmail Free. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/201469229/direct/01/ From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 7 12:36:42 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 7 Mar 2010 18:36:42 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: <4B924E7B.23267.10F3DBE@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 6, 10 12:45:47 pm Message-ID: > I use the well-known trick of strengthing the repair on the > > back with some cotton fabric. > > I use the fiberglass tape that's used for sheetrock joints or > laminating up resin structures. Much stronger than cotton. The True. If its the fibreglass tape I'm thinking of, it's also much stiffer which is a problem for intricate repairs. It depends on what you are repairing. A bit of old shirt works fine for reapirs to most classic computer cases :-) > > though. And contact adhesive is what I sue for sticking on nameplates, > > bits of trim, and that sort of thing. > > I keep a couple of aerosol cans of Scotch Super 77 around for just > that situation, in addition to being downright handy for gluing > mailing labels onto boxes. The ocntact adhesive I'm think of is the one that you apply to oth surfaces, then let it dry for 5 mionutes, or so, and then press them together. It can be difficult to get in the UK, it's the one that 'glue sniffers' like (no, that's not why I like it...), so you have to ask for it. I find it very useful for sticking on nameplates, bits of trim, that sort of thing. Last time I used it was to stick the label and HP badge on the rear shroud of my 9125A plotter. I do dislike having casing screws hidden under stuck-on labels/trim. I can understand why it's done (it keeps total idiots out, it makes it clear somody has been insde), but I still don't like it. WHen I get things like that I normally leave the appropriate bit of trim off after the repair (I keep it, of course, just in case I ever to make it look original). -tony From ploopster at gmail.com Sun Mar 7 15:28:09 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Sun, 07 Mar 2010 16:28:09 -0500 Subject: OT: Best Glue for Marble Message-ID: <4B941A69.30406@gmail.com> Apologies for the OT, but there seem to be quite a few people on this list who are familiar with the subject of glue. I need to attach two pieces of marble to each other. There is a tiny gap between the pieces. What would be the best glue to use for something this hard, smooth and impermeable? Peace... Sridhar From curt at atarimuseum.com Sun Mar 7 16:02:42 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:02:42 -0500 Subject: OT: Best Glue for Marble In-Reply-To: <4B941A69.30406@gmail.com> References: <4B941A69.30406@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B942282.3040102@atarimuseum.com> Silicon adhesive works very well. However it all depends on what kind of stress and/or bearing these pieces may have on each other or separately. Curt On 3/7/2010 4:28 PM, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > > Apologies for the OT, but there seem to be quite a few people on this > list who are familiar with the subject of glue. > > I need to attach two pieces of marble to each other. There is a tiny > gap between the pieces. What would be the best glue to use for > something this hard, smooth and impermeable? > > Peace... Sridhar > From cclist at sydex.com Sun Mar 7 16:23:52 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 07 Mar 2010 14:23:52 -0800 Subject: OT: Best Glue for Marble In-Reply-To: <4B941A69.30406@gmail.com> References: <4B941A69.30406@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B93B6F8.28282.171CF82@cclist.sydex.com> On 7 Mar 2010 at 16:28, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > I need to attach two pieces of marble to each other. There is a tiny > gap between the pieces. What would be the best glue to use for > something this hard, smooth and impermeable? Marble isn't impermeable, but actually quite porous. (Ask anyone who's ever spilled burgundy on an unsealed white marble floor). You want to rough the edges to be joined a bit and then use a made-for- purpose epoxy: http://www.graniteepoxy.com/MarbleEpoxy.php Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Sun Mar 7 20:31:20 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 07 Mar 2010 18:31:20 -0800 Subject: Sorcerer II progress... In-Reply-To: References: <4B924E7B.23267.10F3DBE@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 6, 10 12:45:47 pm, Message-ID: <4B93F0F8.29453.2546241@cclist.sydex.com> On 7 Mar 2010 at 18:36, Tony Duell wrote: > True. If its the fibreglass tape I'm thinking of, it's also much > stiffer which is a problem for intricate repairs. Glass tape comes in various weaves and meshes--some is as thin as 0.0012". --Chuck From sellam at vintagetech.com Mon Mar 8 00:25:32 2010 From: sellam at vintagetech.com (Sellam Ismail) Date: Sun, 7 Mar 2010 22:25:32 -0800 (PST) Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) Message-ID: A straight-8 has come up for sale. I am representing the seller. I have photos and details. If you're interested please e-mail me and I'll send over some information. Preliminary photos are here: http://siconic.com/computers/PDP-8/ We'll take opening offers and if there's one good enough then we'll cut to a straigt (8) sale. Otherwise, it'll move on to a VCF web auction at a future date. 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 hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Mon Mar 8 00:47:21 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Sun, 07 Mar 2010 22:47:21 -0800 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) References: Message-ID: <4B949D79.4F265735@cs.ubc.ca> Sellam Ismail wrote: > > A straight-8 has come up for sale. I am representing the seller. I have > photos and details. If you're interested please e-mail me and I'll send > over some information. > > Preliminary photos are here: > > http://siconic.com/computers/PDP-8/ > > We'll take opening offers and if there's one good enough then we'll cut to > a straigt (8) sale. Otherwise, it'll move on to a VCF web auction at a > future date. > > Thanks!! Two questions of no great consequence: 1. Why does the flip-chip extender appear to extend only half the pins? 2. How did Humphrey Bogart get in there? Or is it straight-8 -> treasure -> happy? From evan at snarc.net Mon Mar 8 00:52:50 2010 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 01:52:50 -0500 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B949EC2.7020400@snarc.net> > A straight-8 has come up for sale. I am representing the seller. I have photos and details. If you're interested please e-mail me and I'll send over some information. > > Preliminary photos are here: > > http://siconic.com/computers/PDP-8/ > > We'll take opening offers and if there's one good enough then we'll cut to a straigt (8) sale. Otherwise, it'll move on to a VCF web auction at a future date. > > Thanks!! > I'm going to watch this transaction with utter fascination, simply to get a better idea of what ours (MARCH's) could be worth. What do you folks think ..... a decent-condition Straight-8 with documents, software on paper tape, etc. should be worth more than (for example) an Apple 1, right? From pontus at Update.UU.SE Mon Mar 8 00:59:58 2010 From: pontus at Update.UU.SE (Pontus Pihlgren) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 07:59:58 +0100 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: <4B949EC2.7020400@snarc.net> References: <4B949EC2.7020400@snarc.net> Message-ID: <20100308065957.GA15383@Update.UU.SE> On Mon, Mar 08, 2010 at 01:52:50AM -0500, Evan Koblentz wrote: > > I'm going to watch this transaction with utter fascination, simply > to get a better idea of what ours (MARCH's) could be worth. What do > you folks think ..... a decent-condition Straight-8 with documents, > software on paper tape, etc. should be worth more than (for example) > an Apple 1, right? Indeed, but an Apple 1 is more widely known which speaks in its favor. /P From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Mon Mar 8 01:17:17 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Sun, 07 Mar 2010 23:17:17 -0800 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) References: <4B949D79.4F265735@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <4B94A47D.1E8C7036@cs.ubc.ca> Brent Hilpert wrote: > > Sellam Ismail wrote: > > > > A straight-8 has come up for sale. I am representing the seller. I have > > photos and details. If you're interested please e-mail me and I'll send > > over some information. > > > > Preliminary photos are here: > > > > http://siconic.com/computers/PDP-8/ > > > > We'll take opening offers and if there's one good enough then we'll cut to > > a straigt (8) sale. Otherwise, it'll move on to a VCF web auction at a > > future date. > > > > Thanks!! > > Two questions of no great consequence: > > 1. Why does the flip-chip extender appear to extend only half the pins? Skip this one, I looked at a couple of flip chips I have and see the edge connectors are single sided, so all the pins can be accounted for on the extender. > 2. How did Humphrey Bogart get in there? > Or is it straight-8 -> treasure -> happy? From steerex at ccvn.com Mon Mar 8 05:03:06 2010 From: steerex at ccvn.com (Steve Robertson) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 06:03:06 -0500 Subject: FS: Wirewrap Prototype Boards References: <4B92A153.6000408@cimmeri.com> Message-ID: <000701cabeae$f44af320$0301a8c0@win2k> Hey guys, Sorry for the shameful plug but... While digging through my stash of stuff, I came upon a pile of AUGAT wirewarp boards. I had totally forgotten that I even had them until I saw the recent posts about prototyping. The boards are approximately 10" X 10" square. They have gold pins that are in a .1" X .4" grid with 31 rows with 82 pins in each row. There are also 21 V+ and GND pins between each of the rows. There are decoupling caps soldered to about 20 percent of the power supply pins. That's 2400+ empty pins on each board! I got the boards many years ago from a scrapper. He had a gaylord bin completely filled with them. Must have been 1000 boards in that bin! Some of the boards will have a few bent pins but, they can be easily straitened. Gold was much cheaper back then so, I grabbed an armload (30 or so). When I needed a board for a project, I just used a jigsaw and cut them into smaller pieces appropriate for the project. Doing that, you can get several nice project boards out of each of the large boards. The boards were from and existing system so, they are already wrapped. To use the boards, you'd just have to unwrap the pins. It's tedious work but at least it is somewhat therapudic. At this point, I making my own PCB's so, I really don't need the wirewrap boards anymore. So, before putting them on ebay, I figured I'd offer them here. I don't have any pictures but I can take some if anyone is interested. These are really nice boards so, I think they would be a bargain at $20 each (plus postage) from North Carolina. Any takers? Steve Robertson steerex [at] ccvn [dot] com From wmaddox at pacbell.net Mon Mar 8 01:46:03 2010 From: wmaddox at pacbell.net (William Maddox) Date: Sun, 7 Mar 2010 23:46:03 -0800 (PST) Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <474857.32591.qm@web82603.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi, Sellam. I was looking at the photos of the Straight-8. The front panel looks to be in good shape, but it has clearly been separated from the remainder of the machine. Is it complete and with all of the cabling? Is there a controller (TC01) in the rack with the TU-55s? Do you know if this equipment is operational? When it was last in service? Does the material for sale constitute the entirety of a once-operational system, or is it "bits-and-pieces" that were salvaged? Best regards, --Bill From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Mon Mar 8 03:47:15 2010 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 10:47:15 +0100 (CET) Subject: Anyone running RTE-M on an HP 21MX series M, E, or F? In-Reply-To: References: , <4B92A153.6000408@cimmeri.com>, Message-ID: On Sun, 7 Mar 2010, dwight elvey wrote: > I figure the HP-IB is the easiest option for mass storeage. I'll most > likely need to write a driver but I can do that. What's wrong with DVM33 (supposed you have a 12821A disc interface card)? Christian From wmaddox at pacbell.net Mon Mar 8 04:38:50 2010 From: wmaddox at pacbell.net (William Maddox) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 02:38:50 -0800 (PST) Subject: They never stop: Yet another fradulent relisting of Ashley's TC11/TU55/RK05 rack Message-ID: <552358.17113.qm@web82608.mail.mud.yahoo.com> He's at it again: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=330411796683&ssPageName=ADME:X:AAQ:US:1123 It's been reported to eBay, as well as to the ebay account owner and the fellow who's website was apparently hijacked to host part of the listing. I've expressed interest in buying the stuff. I wonder if he'll give me enough contact info to get him busted... --Bill From thrashbarg at kaput.homeunix.org Mon Mar 8 05:00:24 2010 From: thrashbarg at kaput.homeunix.org (Alexis) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 21:30:24 +1030 Subject: They never stop: Yet another fradulent relisting of Ashley's TC11/TU55/RK05 rack In-Reply-To: <552358.17113.qm@web82608.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <552358.17113.qm@web82608.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <201003082130.24203.thrashbarg@kaput.homeunix.org> On Mon, 8 Mar 2010 09:08:50 pm William Maddox wrote: > He's at it again: > > http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=330411796683&ssPageName= > ADME:X:AAQ:US:1123 That and the 21 other auctions listed for the same item. 230446540393, 330411796408, 330411796421, 330411796424, 330411796439, 330411796440, 230446540478, 330411796471, 230446540497, 230446540520, 230446540533, 330411796491, 330411796497, 230446540551, 330411796506, 230446540583, 330411796519, 330411796525, 330411796526, 330411796664, 230446540731 This really gets up my nose. Alexis. From ian_primus at yahoo.com Mon Mar 8 07:22:03 2010 From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 05:22:03 -0800 (PST) Subject: They never stop: Yet another fradulent relisting of Ashley's TC11/TU55/RK05 rack In-Reply-To: <201003082130.24203.thrashbarg@kaput.homeunix.org> Message-ID: <222221.58368.qm@web52608.mail.re2.yahoo.com> --- On Mon, 3/8/10, Alexis wrote: > William Maddox wrote: > > He's at it again: > > > > http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=330411796683&ssPageName= > > ADME:X:AAQ:US:1123 > > That and the 21 other auctions listed for the same item. > > 230446540393, 330411796408, 330411796421, 330411796424, > 330411796439, > 330411796440, 230446540478, 330411796471, 230446540497, > 230446540520, > 230446540533, 330411796491, 330411796497, 230446540551, > 330411796506, > 230446540583, 330411796519, 330411796525, 330411796526, > 330411796664, > 230446540731 > > This really gets up my nose. One wonders who he *really* thinks is going to fall for this. I mean, if you are the kind of person that wants a 30 year old DEC tape drive/etc, you would also be the sort of person to be able to see such a blatent, obvious scam... (Text in an image, special terms of sale and a price that doesn't match the auction, requiring that the sale be completed outside of eBay, etc...) -Ian From hachti at hachti.de Mon Mar 8 08:12:57 2010 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:12:57 +0100 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: <4B94A47D.1E8C7036@cs.ubc.ca> References: <4B949D79.4F265735@cs.ubc.ca> <4B94A47D.1E8C7036@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <4B9505E9.6090707@hachti.de> > Skip this one, I looked at a couple of flip chips I have and see the edge > connectors are single sided, so all the pins can be accounted for on the extender. I just looked at a couple of flip chip modules - they're all double sided. But they are M-series modules (slightly newer, using 74xx TTL ICs, from pdp8/i and pdp8/l and RK05)... -- http://www.hachti.de From hachti at hachti.de Mon Mar 8 08:14:24 2010 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:14:24 +0100 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: <4B949EC2.7020400@snarc.net> References: <4B949EC2.7020400@snarc.net> Message-ID: <4B950640.5010807@hachti.de> Hi. > a decent-condition Straight-8 with documents, software > on paper tape, etc. should be worth more than (for example) an Apple 1, > right? I think you cannot count the software and (most) manuals.... This stuff seems to be widely available. -- http://www.hachti.de From tshoppa at wmata.com Mon Mar 8 12:10:33 2010 From: tshoppa at wmata.com (Shoppa, Tim) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 13:10:33 -0500 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: > 2. How did Humphrey Bogart get in there? > Or is it straight-8 -> treasure -> happy? Suggested language usage: Dude, don't bogart that straight 8! Tim. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Mar 8 12:15:36 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 13:15:36 -0500 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mon, Mar 8, 2010 at 1:10 PM, Shoppa, Tim wrote: >> 2. How did Humphrey Bogart get in there? >> ? ?Or is it straight-8 -> treasure -> happy? > > Suggested language usage: > > Dude, don't bogart that straight 8! Pass the DECtape on the left-hand side? -ethan From keithvz at verizon.net Mon Mar 8 12:36:37 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:36:37 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? Message-ID: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? While I think it is the right thing to do intellectually to expand my knowledge, I often think that I waste a lot of time trying to do fairly simple tasks in areas where I have limited knowledge or experience. I think challenges can be rewarding, and I enjoy them. "Anything worth doing is hard." I think is the phrase. I try to do the necessary research, background reading, start from the ground up before attempting to do anything. I still find that getting your hands in it, ie learning by doing, seems to help the process along. With all this being said, it sure is frustrating and the rewards come slowly. While I DO like instant gratification, I don't expect it. I do expect that the payoff, it terms of reward vs time spent is reasonable. As my available personal free time has been less and less lately, making sure that I'm not just wasting my time is important to me. Do you find that you spend most of your time on projects that are well within your knowledge and experience, or most of your time learning about new technology/skills/programming language/hardware/etc to facilitate accomplishing a new project? Thanks Keith From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Mar 8 12:41:28 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 12:41:28 -0600 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: <4B949EC2.7020400@snarc.net> References: <4B949EC2.7020400@snarc.net> Message-ID: <4B9544D8.2050502@gmail.com> Evan Koblentz wrote: > I'm going to watch this transaction with utter fascination, simply to > get a better idea of what ours (MARCH's) could be worth. What do you > folks think ..... a decent-condition Straight-8 with documents, software > on paper tape, etc. should be worth more than (for example) an Apple 1, > right? Anything between zero and a million according to mutual agreement between buyer and seller? :-) I've really given up trying to attribute monetary worth to things* - for most things it all seems rather random these days (and I have a tendency to blame ebay, but even before it came about there were bargains and rip-offs aplenty) What it might come down to is how many surviving S-8's are "known about" and who owns them (if all of them are among collectors and museums who would likely conduct high-profile sales, the "worth" is likely to be different than if there are still some rotting in barns where a farmer might sell "that old bit of junk" for a few bucks) * at least for exchanges of items; I think it's perhaps a little clearer-cut in the insurance world as you can go for the highest number likely to be encountered and add a percentage for "hassle factor" cheers Jules From spectre at floodgap.com Mon Mar 8 12:42:07 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 10:42:07 -0800 (PST) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> from Keith at "Mar 8, 10 01:36:37 pm" Message-ID: <201003081842.o28Ig7v2017046@floodgap.com> > Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? I try dating occasionally. It is weird. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- In memory of Bob Crane ----------------------------------------------------- From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 8 12:45:16 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 13:45:16 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <201003081842.o28Ig7v2017046@floodgap.com> References: <201003081842.o28Ig7v2017046@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <04ED1934-60D8-4C4D-89B7-121139C77F35@neurotica.com> On Mar 8, 2010, at 1:42 PM, Cameron Kaiser wrote: >> Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? > > I try dating occasionally. It is weird. soda -> keyboard > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mtapley at swri.edu Mon Mar 8 12:40:00 2010 From: mtapley at swri.edu (Mark Tapley) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 12:40:00 -0600 Subject: Message-ID: At 22:25:32 -0800 3/8/10, Sellam wrote: A straight-8 has come up for sale. I am representing the seller.... At 06:03:06 -0500 3/8/10, Steve wrote: >Hey guys, >Sorry for the shameful plug but... Kudos to Steve for his manners! Yeah, I know. :-( See the subject. Couldn't resist the 'attaboy. Don't think Sellam reads this anyway. From evan at snarc.net Mon Mar 8 12:46:54 2010 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:46:54 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B95461E.4010908@snarc.net> > Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? Yes: social interaction beyond machines. :) From js at cimmeri.com Mon Mar 8 12:47:40 2010 From: js at cimmeri.com (js at cimmeri.com) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:47:40 -0500 Subject: Anyone running RTE-M on an HP 21MX series M, E, or F? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B95464C.3020408@cimmeri.com> > [Christian Corti replied:] > Hm, I've never tried RTE-M, although I have rev. 2140 on magtape. ** Christian, thank you for taking the time to reply. I'd like to ask you a question re your RTE-M off-list... would you kindly send me your email? js at cimmeri.com -- I tried your "cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de" address a few times but it bounces back. > Instead, I prefer RTE-6/VM on the 1000F. I have a setup with a 7905 > (shared in a multi-cpu configuration with a HP 2100S), a 7970B, a > 7970E, a 9122C, a 7958B (system disk), 2648 on a BACI and a terminal > server on all the ports of an 8-channel MUX. Lovely system, and very > different from most modern stuff. > And the 2100S runs RTE-II from the fixed platter of the 7905. ** I am very impressed with your collection. How did you get a 9122C working? > Simh has proved to be very useful especially when generating a new > system. ** Yes, it looks like we'll be forced to use SIMH to try to generate a CS/80 compatible primary tape. John Singleton From bryan.pope at comcast.net Mon Mar 8 13:00:26 2010 From: bryan.pope at comcast.net (Bryan Pope) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:00:26 -0500 Subject: In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B95494A.8020100@comcast.net> On 3/8/2010 1:40 PM, Mark Tapley wrote: > At 22:25:32 -0800 3/8/10, Sellam wrote: > A straight-8 has come up for sale. I am representing the seller.... > > At 06:03:06 -0500 3/8/10, Steve wrote: >> Hey guys, >> Sorry for the shameful plug but... > > Kudos to Steve for his manners! > > Yeah, I know. :-( See the subject. > Couldn't resist the 'attaboy. > Don't think Sellam reads this anyway. Geez, someone has got a thing against Sellam! It is really lame to go after someone like this who has done a LOT to further vintage computing. Cheers, Bryan From brianlanning at gmail.com Mon Mar 8 13:21:19 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 13:21:19 -0600 Subject: Way OT: hydroponics Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003081121m7965abd5p26d1411f3734d4ad@mail.gmail.com> If anyone here is into hydroponics, please let me know off-list. I have a few questions. Thanks. My wife suggested I use a classic computer to monitor the system. :-) brian From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 8 12:55:24 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 18:55:24 +0000 (GMT) Subject: OT: Best Glue for Marble In-Reply-To: <4B942282.3040102@atarimuseum.com> from "Curt @ Atari Museum" at Mar 7, 10 05:02:42 pm Message-ID: > > Silicon adhesive works very well. However it all depends on what > kind of stress and/or bearing these pieces may have on each other or > separately. I doubt doubt for an instant that adhesives have improved massivle in the last 100 years. However, for historical (hysterical?) reasons I'll include a little bit from "Watch and Clockmakers' Handbook, Dictionary and Guide" by F. J. Britten. Mine is the 10th editon, 1902. If yoy are repairing some antique object, you may want to use the methods that were used when it was originally made. 'Mending Marble Clock Cases -- Plaster of Paris may be used, but it is bette, especially if the mended part is visible, to soak the plaster of Paris in saturated solution of alum, and then bake it. It is used with water, may be mixed with any desired colouring material and will take a high polish. Lime and white of egg make the best cement for closely fitting surfaces, but it requires using very quickly as it so soon sets. Marble case makers use a cemetn composed of Russian tallow, brickdust, and resin melted together, and it sets as hard as stone at ordinary temperatures'. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 8 13:13:16 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 19:13:16 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: <4B949EC2.7020400@snarc.net> from "Evan Koblentz" at Mar 8, 10 01:52:50 am Message-ID: > folks think ..... a decent-condition Straight-8 with documents, software > on paper tape, etc. should be worth more than (for example) an Apple 1, > right? I am not conviced. Everyody has heard of Apple (if only for things like the Ipod, Iphone, etc). Many fewer people have heard of DEC. I am not sure rarity is the only factor in determining the price (and desing/build quality certainly isn't...) Put it thsi way. From where I am sitting I can see 3 machines which are a _lot_ rarer than either the Apple on or the straight-8. But I doubt I could get more than $100 for any of them (This is not an offer to sell them...). -tony From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Mon Mar 8 13:47:04 2010 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 11:47:04 -0800 (PST) Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mon, 8 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: >> folks think ..... a decent-condition Straight-8 with documents, software >> on paper tape, etc. should be worth more than (for example) an Apple 1, >> right? > > I am not conviced. Everyody has heard of Apple (if only for things like > the Ipod, Iphone, etc). Many fewer people have heard of DEC. I am not > sure rarity is the only factor in determining the price (and desing/build > quality certainly isn't...) > > Put it thsi way. From where I am sitting I can see 3 machines which are > a _lot_ rarer than either the Apple on or the straight-8. But I doubt I > could get more than $100 for any of them (This is not an offer to sell > them...). I'm curious what these three machines are. -- 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 wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Mar 8 14:02:37 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 15:02:37 -0500 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: > I'm curious what these three machines are. I'm not. -- Will From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 8 13:59:16 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 19:59:16 +0000 (GMT) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> from "Keith" at Mar 8, 10 01:36:37 pm Message-ID: > > Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? That depelds on 'how far outsiode' they are... I would certainly consider just about anything related to electronics, engineeriong, mechancial/eletctrical/electronic repair, that sort of thing. Even if I had no direct experience in that area. But I probably wouldn;'t try, say, climbing a mountain. > While I think it is the right thing to do intellectually to expand my > knowledge, I often think that I waste a lot of time trying to do fairly > simple tasks in areas where I have limited knowledge or experience. OK, it takes you longer than it would take somebody who's been doing it for years. But then you learn how to do it, and next time it takes you a lot less time. I don;t think you can put a 'price' on learning like that. To me it will always be worth learnign how to do it myself. > I think challenges can be rewarding, and I enjoy them. "Anything worth > doing is hard." I think is the phrase. However, Ido feel that the difficulties should be real and not artificial. For example (to keep thios on-topic), diagnosing and repairing a TTL-based minicomputer may well be hard. Boing it without certain test gear when you have that test gear sitting on the bench is plain stupid. I use whatever tools and facilities I have to help me. And I still find it hard... > I try to do the necessary research, background reading, start from the > ground up before attempting to do anything. I still find that getting > your hands in it, ie learning by doing, seems to help the process along. Many times I've read the manuals, read up on the theroy, and so on and have thought 'Am I ever going to get this right?' And then when I actually have a go, it all makes perfect sense and it's a lot easier than I expected. I have noticed one curious thing. The part I worry about -- the bit I think is going to cause problems -- is often trivial when I come to do it. And I have problems in some totally different area. I guess it's becuase I've thught a lot more about the bit I think is going to be hard. Do others have this experioence? > > With all this being said, it sure is frustrating and the rewards come > slowly. While I DO like instant gratification, I don't expect it. I do > expect that the payoff, it terms of reward vs time spent is reasonable. Often, for me, it's solving hte problems, and fixing the device that's more interesting than the device when I've fixed it. I mentioned last week that I'd just repaired an HP2631B printer. Now, while I will problably use that printer on one of my HP9000/200 machines I don't really _need_ another text-only dot matrix printer. But I got a lot of fun out of understnading how the electronics should work and findign the faults. > As my available personal free time has been less and less lately, > making sure that I'm not just wasting my time is important to me. > > Do you find that you spend most of your time on projects that are well > within your knowledge and experience, or most of your time learning > about new technology/skills/programming language/hardware/etc to > facilitate accomplishing a new project? I don't want to try to figure out how I allocate my time, but I spend some time doing both. I don't not do womething becuase I am sure I know how to do it and won't learn anything by doing it (for example, the pinouts nad functions of common TTL chips are in permanent storage in my brain, I don't actively avoid TTL as a result), but I have no objection to spending time learnign new (to me) stuff. Perhaps I take this to extremes sometimes, I learnt (and am still learning, of course) how to use a lathe so as to make new parts for classic computers. I read up on how to wind small motors to repair an HP9125A plotter (snd still got it wrong the first time). -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 8 14:03:35 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 20:03:35 +0000 (GMT) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: <201003081842.o28Ig7v2017046@floodgap.com> from "Cameron Kaiser" at Mar 8, 10 10:42:07 am Message-ID: > > > Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? > > I try dating occasionally. It is weird. What? With an MOTAS [1]? Fortunately (I guess) there are no such people who wish to associate with somebody whose idea of a good time involves machine tools... [1] A = appropriate. I am not making any comments on your lifestyle. I don't know, and it's nothing to do with me. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 8 14:08:06 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 20:08:06 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: from "David Griffith" at Mar 8, 10 11:47:04 am Message-ID: > > Put it thsi way. From where I am sitting I can see 3 machines which are > > a _lot_ rarer than either the Apple on or the straight-8. But I doubt I > > could get more than $100 for any of them (This is not an offer to sell > > them...). > > I'm curious what these three machines are. PERQ AGW3300 (aka PERQ 3a), PERQ 2T4 and AMT DAP 610 -tony From evan at snarc.net Mon Mar 8 14:11:36 2010 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:11:36 -0500 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9559F8.8050302@snarc.net> >> I'm curious what these three machines are. >> > I'm not. > I am. :) From rborsuk at colourfull.com Mon Mar 8 14:19:37 2010 From: rborsuk at colourfull.com (Robert Borsuk) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 15:19:37 -0500 Subject: OT:(rare systems) Re: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mar 8, 2010, at 3:08 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > > PERQ AGW3300 (aka PERQ 3a), PERQ 2T4 and AMT DAP 610 > > -tony Sign me up. I have a AMT DAP 610 with all the manuals, software and the sun workstations that went with it. Rob Rob Borsuk email: rborsuk at colourfull.com Colourfull Creations Web: http://www.colourfull.com From jdr_use at bluewin.ch Mon Mar 8 14:20:42 2010 From: jdr_use at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:20:42 +0100 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B955C1A.9060409@bluewin.ch> > AMT DAP 610 > Running ? Seems like a hard system to keep running. Jos From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Mar 8 14:29:26 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 15:29:26 -0500 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: <4B955C1A.9060409@bluewin.ch> References: <4B955C1A.9060409@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: Not for nothing, but pretty much any collector that has been around for more than six months has a few really rare machines. -- Will, jaded. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 8 14:32:12 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 20:32:12 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: from "Tony Duell" at Mar 8, 10 08:08:06 pm Message-ID: > > > Put it thsi way. From where I am sitting I can see 3 machines which are > > > a _lot_ rarer than either the Apple on or the straight-8. But I doubt I > > > could get more than $100 for any of them (This is not an offer to sell > > > them...). > > > > I'm curious what these three machines are. > > PERQ AGW3300 (aka PERQ 3a), PERQ 2T4 and AMT DAP 610 Or alternatively, an HH Tiger, a Commodore P500 and an FTS-88. The first 2 are probably more common than the Apple 1 or Straight 8 (although neither is exactly common), but the last is I susepct rarer. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 8 14:35:07 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 20:35:07 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: <4B955C1A.9060409@bluewin.ch> from "Jos Dreesen" at Mar 8, 10 09:20:42 pm Message-ID: > > > > AMT DAP 610 > > > > > Running ? Seems like a hard system to keep running. The logic is perfect (and I have the user manuals, VAX host software (on TK50s), etc. It currently has a PSU problem that I must get round to fixing... -tony From teoz at neo.rr.com Mon Mar 8 14:37:22 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 15:37:22 -0500 Subject: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) References: <4B955C1A.9060409@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <1069840926DF4CC4A804A16D4B3DBDD1@dell8300> ----- Original Message ----- From: "William Donzelli" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Monday, March 08, 2010 3:29 PM Subject: Re: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) > Not for nothing, but pretty much any collector that has been around > for more than six months has a few really rare machines. > > -- > Will, jaded. I have been collecting since 2001 or so, nothing rare here just a few uncommon units and parts. From evan at snarc.net Mon Mar 8 14:53:31 2010 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:53:31 -0500 Subject: rare systems Message-ID: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> Guys, don't confuse "rare" with "more historic". "Rare" just means "fewer". If the people at Tandy produced a limited-edition TRS-80, and the only difference was it had a yellow polka-dot case design, and only 100 were ever made, does that mean it's more "rare" than a Straight-8? Technically, yes! Does that make it more historic? It's too dumb a question to even ask. (I'm not putting down the PERQ systems, etc.; those are certainly historic in their own regard.) And yes, DEC isn't as popular as Apple; there won't be millions of DEC fanboys and stuff ...... But it's hard to argue that the Straight-8 isn't one of the most * historic * systems ever made, re: historic = grand context and importance to the history of the computer industry. Rarity is a big factor too, but the '8 has it all. Historic, rare, desirable. From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Mar 8 15:00:35 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 16:00:35 -0500 Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> Message-ID: Second sweeping generalization: All old computers are historic. In the railroad preservation field, the question "How many steam locomotives are historic?" yields the semi-serious answer "All of them". -- Will, jaded and cynical From jdr_use at bluewin.ch Mon Mar 8 15:19:23 2010 From: jdr_use at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 22:19:23 +0100 Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> Message-ID: <4B9569DB.8000303@bluewin.ch> Evan Koblentz wrote: > Guys, don't confuse "rare" with "more historic". "Rare" just means > "fewer". If the people at Tandy produced a limited-edition TRS-80, > and the only difference was it had a yellow polka-dot case design, and > only 100 were ever made, does that mean it's more "rare" than a > Straight-8? Technically, yes! Does that make it more historic? It's > too dumb a question to even ask. > > (I'm not putting down the PERQ systems, etc.; those are certainly > historic in their own regard.) > > And yes, DEC isn't as popular as Apple; there won't be millions of DEC > fanboys and stuff ...... > > But it's hard to argue that the Straight-8 isn't one of the most * > historic * systems ever made, re: historic = grand context and > importance to the history of the computer industry. Rarity is a big > factor too, but the '8 has it all. Historic, rare, desirable. > Evan, are you watching this transaction with utter fascination, or driving up the price ? ( insert smiley ) My rarest system : a homebuilt 12bit TTL machine : it is a one off ! Jos From ray at arachelian.com Mon Mar 8 15:19:51 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 16:19:51 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B9569F7.1000107@arachelian.com> Keith wrote: > Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? Absolutely. Last year I found a scratch on the back of my car and wanted to fix it myself. So I did. In the process, I messed up the finish a lot more, so I had to sand it down and start over a few times until I got it just right. Was the first time I ever tried such a thing, so it was a mess, and even now it's a bit visible up close, but from a few feet away you can't tell. breaking them, I'd be very happy.Recently the tiles in my kitchen started to rise and the grout from the sides started to loosen free. That's the next project. I've no idea how to fix them, but researching that now. The hard part is I don't have any more spares, and since they're so old the home depot will have non-matching ones. So if I can figure out how to completely loosen them out without (they're still sticking though somewhat wiggling) :-) Hey, if you've any ideas on how to fix'em or why they'd start rising up, I'm all ears. > > While I think it is the right thing to do intellectually to expand my > knowledge, I often think that I waste a lot of time trying to do > fairly simple tasks in areas where I have limited knowledge or > experience. True, to get to mastery level of almost anything takes about 10 years, so how close is good enough for what you're trying to learn? Likely, you'll need just good enough, which can be something the 80/20 rule provides. > I think challenges can be rewarding, and I enjoy them. "Anything > worth doing is hard." I think is the phrase. They are. Well worth it. Especially if you're the kind of person that gets a huge reward out of figuring something out or getting something accomplished. No, just getting out of bed doesn't count, though I've had trouble doing that the last few days since I've seemed to have caught the Martian Death Flu from my kids and have been going back and forth between fever and chills. :( > > I try to do the necessary research, background reading, start from the > ground up before attempting to do anything. I still find that getting > your hands in it, ie learning by doing, seems to help the process along. > > With all this being said, it sure is frustrating and the rewards come > slowly. While I DO like instant gratification, I don't expect it. I > do expect that the payoff, it terms of reward vs time spent is > reasonable. As my available personal free time has been less and less > lately, making sure that I'm not just wasting my time is important to me. Depends on how much the reward is worth, and what other things would your rather spend your time with. If you want instant gratification, pay someone else to do it - if it's something that can be done by someone else. If you want a real reward, do it yourself. Take the time to learn how, practice on something less valuable, then when you feel up to it, go for it. i.e. say you're trying to learn how to solder, find some piece of junk like an old VCR, take it apart and practice soldering and desoldering the boards until you can do it cleanly without harming the boards, the components, or burning yourself. > > Do you find that you spend most of your time on projects that are well > within your knowledge and experience, or most of your time learning > about new technology/skills/programming language/hardware/etc to > facilitate accomplishing a new project? Most of the time, I spend time on what I know, but that includes the day job - less than 30% on new things. But I always keep an eye out for the new thing that might prove a useful skill. From healyzh at aracnet.com Mon Mar 8 15:20:26 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 13:20:26 -0800 (PST) Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> Message-ID: All old steam engines are worth saving. Most old computers are not. Zane On Mon, 8 Mar 2010, William Donzelli wrote: > Second sweeping generalization: > > All old computers are historic. > > In the railroad preservation field, the question "How many steam > locomotives are historic?" yields the semi-serious answer "All of > them". > > -- > Will, jaded and cynical > From ray at arachelian.com Mon Mar 8 15:23:07 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 16:23:07 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <201003081842.o28Ig7v2017046@floodgap.com> References: <201003081842.o28Ig7v2017046@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <4B956ABB.7060409@arachelian.com> Cameron Kaiser wrote: >> Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? >> > > I try dating occasionally. It is weird. > > This instructional video may prove entertaining, if not useless: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DvIpgdYqQA :-) From brad at heeltoe.com Mon Mar 8 15:40:43 2010 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 16:40:43 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> (sfid-20100308_133835_414545_AA9D06C5) References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> (sfid-20100308_133835_414545_AA9D06C5) Message-ID: On Mar 8, 2010, at 1:36 PM, Keith wrote: > Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? Yes. I've found as a consultant (and a engineer), if I didn't pretty much reinvent myself every 10 years I became irrelevant. Or, at least the things I knew how to do well became irrelevant. (don't get much call these days for bringing up 68000 hardware, for instance) Also, knowing a lot about 20V10 CPLD's isn't very much in call. But being able to bring up the internal PPC's in a Virtex 2 was a helpful skill over the past 5 years, especially if you knew how to do it in modelsim. So, turns out that playing with verilog and various simulators was a good use of my time. The only way to learn something new is to go do it, imho. The first time is usually not very good. The second ok, and third becomes reasonably good. > While I think it is the right thing to do intellectually to expand my knowledge, I often think that I waste a lot of time trying to do fairly simple tasks in areas where I have limited knowledge or experience. Well, not everything is worth learning by everyone. I don't try and do BGA rework. It's much easier to have a specialist do that. And I don't do PCB's over 8 layers or 200MHz - again - it's more "leveraged" to have a specialist do it. Having said that, it's worth spending time studying the literature on what happens when you pass a 1GHz signal through a via. You'll learn a lot and that might come in useful even if you didn't do the layout. Ditto with issue surrounding PCB design rules and manufacturability. Those change all the time and one needs to devote some time to staying "current". Sometimes when you do this you become a dilettante. Not really good at anything. But my opinion is that being a generalist in a handful of areas an a specialist in a few is a good thing. Others may disagree. A lot depends on your personality, to be honest. I would do what you find enjoyable, even if that means you are a complete specialist. (did I mention writing microcode is fun? :-) > With all this being said, it sure is frustrating and the rewards come slowly. While I DO like instant gratification, I don't expect it. I do expect that the payoff, it terms of reward vs time spent is reasonable. As my available personal free time has been less and less lately, making sure that I'm not just wasting my time is important to me. I have found that if you are not completely sick of a project, it's not done. By the time it is done you are sick of looking at it, mostly because the last 20% take forever and requires herculean perseverance. But when it's done you've learned a lot and you have something to show for your efforts. > Do you find that you spend most of your time on projects that are well within your knowledge and experience, or most of your time learning about new technology/skills/programming language/hardware/etc to facilitate accomplishing a new project? People pay me for what I've already done. I do new stuff on the side, mostly, just to stay relevant (and for fun, to be honest). Sometimes, if a task is very new and no one has done it before, I will get paid to try. But that's in the 20% range. But as I said, If I only did what I knew, I would have been out of a job long ago. plus, they say that learning new things slows down dementia... -brad Brad Parker Heeltoe Consulting 781-483-3101 http://www.heeltoe.com From evan at snarc.net Mon Mar 8 15:42:14 2010 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 16:42:14 -0500 Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: <4B9569DB.8000303@bluewin.ch> References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> <4B9569DB.8000303@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <4B956F36.1060305@snarc.net> >> Guys, don't confuse "rare" with "more historic". "Rare" just means >> "fewer". If the people at Tandy produced a limited-edition TRS-80, >> and the only difference was it had a yellow polka-dot case design, >> and only 100 were ever made, does that mean it's more "rare" than a >> Straight-8? Technically, yes! Does that make it more historic? >> It's too dumb a question to even ask. >> >> (I'm not putting down the PERQ systems, etc.; those are certainly >> historic in their own regard.) >> >> And yes, DEC isn't as popular as Apple; there won't be millions of >> DEC fanboys and stuff ...... >> >> But it's hard to argue that the Straight-8 isn't one of the most * >> historic * systems ever made, re: historic = grand context and >> importance to the history of the computer industry. Rarity is a big >> factor too, but the '8 has it all. Historic, rare, desirable. >> > > Evan, > > are you watching this transaction with utter fascination, or driving > up the price ? ( insert smiley ) LOL .... for the purpose of * acquiring * systems, we all want prices to go * down *, right? But for the purpose of our personal (and in my case, museum) collections, we want prices to go up. Quite a dilemma. Of course, I want to see Sellam be successful and make lots of money in this field. The success of VintageTech directly helps improve the VCF events, which helps popularize our hobby, and helps my own group be successful too. From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 8 16:02:30 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 17:02:30 -0500 Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> Message-ID: <0FE8F8F1-57CD-4393-905E-E863750F2831@neurotica.com> On Mar 8, 2010, at 4:20 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > All old steam engines are worth saving. Most old computers are not. Urr? I think it's just the opposite. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Mon Mar 8 16:07:03 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:07:03 -0700 Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: <4B9569DB.8000303@bluewin.ch> References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> <4B9569DB.8000303@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <4B957507.10201@jetnet.ab.ca> Jos Dreesen wrote: > are you watching this transaction with utter fascination, or driving up > the price ? ( insert smiley ) > > My rarest system : a homebuilt 12bit TTL machine : it is a one off ! Any intresting features? I still have a bunch unused front panel switches just waiting for a good project to with them. I plan to build a good 20 bit LS computer, someday since I still am playing around with tube audio. I got the sound I like but dreaded 120 Hz noise is there so that will kill any digital projects for a while as I try to find the proper power supply design for this kind of amp[1]. > Jos Ben. [1] I belive the low noise/hum possible but very little is on how to design a LCLC power supply is on the web. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Mon Mar 8 16:09:31 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:09:31 -0700 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B9569F7.1000107@arachelian.com> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B9569F7.1000107@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <4B95759B.9000708@jetnet.ab.ca> Ray Arachelian wrote: > breaking them, I'd be very happy.Recently the tiles in my kitchen > started to rise and the grout from the sides started to loosen free. > That's the next project. I've no idea how to fix them, but researching > that now. The hard part is I don't have any more spares, and since > they're so old the home depot will have non-matching ones. So if I can > figure out how to completely loosen them out without (they're still > sticking though somewhat wiggling) :-) Hey, if you've any ideas on > how to fix'em or why they'd start rising up, I'm all ears. > You have checked for un-dead in your area ... right !? From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Mar 8 16:19:05 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 17:19:05 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <201003081842.o28Ig7v2017046@floodgap.com> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <201003081842.o28Ig7v2017046@floodgap.com> Message-ID: > I try dating occasionally. It is weird. > > -- > ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- > ?Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com > -- In memory of Bob Crane ----------------------------------------------------- I understand that dates with Bob Crane did get kind of weird. -- Will From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Mar 8 16:21:01 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 16:21:01 -0600 Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> Message-ID: <4B95784D.8090102@gmail.com> Zane H. Healy wrote: > All old steam engines are worth saving. Most old computers are not. Care to elaborate? From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 8 16:28:25 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:28:25 -0800 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B9569F7.1000107@arachelian.com> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net>, <4B9569F7.1000107@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <4B950989.3032.16280CE@cclist.sydex.com> On 8 Mar 2010 at 16:19, Ray Arachelian wrote: > I'd be very happy.Recently the tiles in my kitchen > started to rise and the grout from the sides started to loosen free. > That's the next project. I've no idea how to fix them, but > researching that now. The hard part is I don't have any more spares, > and since they're so old the home depot will have non-matching ones. > So if I can figure out how to completely loosen them out without > (they're still sticking though somewhat wiggling) :-) Hey, if > you've any ideas on how to fix'em or why they'd start rising up, I'm > all ears. Do you live in house built on a concrete slab foundation, with the tiles attached to the slab? It sounds as if you do. The remedy is to take all of the tiles up, Clean (and patch if necessary) the slab, seal it (probably wasn't done originally) and go from there with the proper mortar for the tile. You might as well buy new tile while you're at it, since you're not going to get all of the original tiles up in one piece anyway. I won't do things that I clearly don't have sufficient experience for. When I put solid oak floors in the house, I had no problem with laying the flooring (or any of the other woodworking or ceramic tile), but when it came to sanding, I called in a professional. Too many DIY sanding jobs require a dose of dramamine on the part of the viewer. --Chuck From ray at arachelian.com Mon Mar 8 16:33:28 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 17:33:28 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B95759B.9000708@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B9569F7.1000107@arachelian.com> <4B95759B.9000708@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4B957B38.4050702@arachelian.com> Ben wrote: > Ray Arachelian wrote: > >> Recently the tiles in my kitchen >> started to rise and the grout from the sides started to loosen free. >> That's the next project. I've no idea how to fix them, but researching >> that now. The hard part is I don't have any more spares, and since >> they're so old the home depot will have non-matching ones. So if I can >> figure out how to completely loosen them out without breaking them, >> I'd be very happy (they're still >> sticking though somewhat wiggling) :-) Hey, if you've any ideas on >> how to fix'em or why they'd start rising up, I'm all ears. >> > You have checked for un-dead in your area ... right !? > No, but I did hear a whisper in the middle of night, sounded something like brrraaaaainnnnnzzzzzzzz, but I can't be sure. Maybe I shouldn't have tried to summon Cthulhu last Holloween. Oh well... When the stars are right and all that. From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 8 16:33:54 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:33:54 -0800 Subject: FS: Wirewrap Prototype Boards In-Reply-To: <000701cabeae$f44af320$0301a8c0@win2k> References: , <000701cabeae$f44af320$0301a8c0@win2k> Message-ID: <4B950AD2.23114.1678654@cclist.sydex.com> On 8 Mar 2010 at 6:03, Steve Robertson wrote: > The boards are approximately 10" X 10" square. They have gold pins > that are in a .1" X .4" grid with 31 rows with 82 pins in each row. Were these for 10K series ECL? (0.3" spacing for DIPs + 1 row for SIP terminators). Otherwise, I'm having trouble picturing what these would be used for. --Chuck From ray at arachelian.com Mon Mar 8 16:42:14 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 17:42:14 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B950989.3032.16280CE@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net>, <4B9569F7.1000107@arachelian.com> <4B950989.3032.16280CE@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B957D46.50800@arachelian.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > Do you live in house built on a concrete slab foundation, with the > tiles attached to the slab? It sounds as if you do. The remedy is > to take all of the tiles up, Clean (and patch if necessary) the > slab, seal it (probably wasn't done originally) and go from there > with the proper mortar for the tile. You might as well buy new tile > while you're at it, since you're not going to get all of the original > tiles up in one piece anyway. > I believe this is the case, but can't verify yet as I've not been able to pry a tile out fully. If I can fix the two or three that are rising, I'll be happy, if not, if it turns out I'll have to redo the whole kitchen floor, I'll get a contractor. At that point, it wouldn't be worth the effort involved to do the whole floor myself and possibly getting it wrong and having to redo it a year later, or whatever. There was a lot of weird stuff with this house. A few years ago, the wooden floor tiles in another area started to peel off, they turned out to be humidity sensitive, and they were very thin - maybe 1/4th inch or something glued to each other in patterns. There was no wood underneath them as you'd expect. Instead, someone installed them ontop of a previous vinyl floor. So we paid a guy to redo it, and it's much better now. So maybe this will turn out that way also... But I'll keep scraping around the grout and wiggling when I'm over the flu and see if I can pry one off. From teoz at neo.rr.com Mon Mar 8 16:55:10 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 17:55:10 -0500 Subject: rare systems References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> <4B9569DB.8000303@bluewin.ch> <4B956F36.1060305@snarc.net> Message-ID: <9A50DEAA9AE74ADE889A51F27A2818F0@dell8300> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Evan Koblentz" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Monday, March 08, 2010 4:42 PM Subject: Re: rare systems > LOL .... for the purpose of * acquiring * systems, we all want prices to > go * down *, right? But for the purpose of our personal (and in my case, > museum) collections, we want prices to go up. Quite a dilemma. > > Of course, I want to see Sellam be successful and make lots of money in > this field. The success of VintageTech directly helps improve the VCF > events, which helps popularize our hobby, and helps my own group be > successful too. Prices should be a few times scrap value at minimum so they are worth seeking a buyer, and cheap enough that people do not start hoarding them for profit driving prices up for no real reason (bubble). Why does the hobby have to be popular with the mainstream anyway? From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 8 17:02:24 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:02:24 -0800 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B957D46.50800@arachelian.com> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net>, <4B950989.3032.16280CE@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B957D46.50800@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <4B951180.13402.1819EDF@cclist.sydex.com> On 8 Mar 2010 at 17:42, Ray Arachelian wrote: > There was a lot of weird stuff with this house. A few years ago, the > wooden floor tiles in another area started to peel off, they turned > out to be humidity sensitive, and they were very thin - maybe 1/4th > inch or something glued to each other in patterns. There was no wood > underneath them as you'd expect. Instead, someone installed them > ontop of a previous vinyl floor. So we paid a guy to redo it, and > it's much better now. So maybe this will turn out that way also... > But I'll keep scraping around the grout and wiggling when I'm over the > flu and see if I can pry one off. I've got an ugly feeling that your tiles were simply attached with mastic to an existing vinyl floor. I've laid ceramic tile over vinyl- -but glued and screwed (to the subfloor) a layer of concrete backer board, then set the tile in thinset mortar the regular way. It worked for me (still looks great after nearly 20 years), because the hardwood flooring in adjacent areas was bringing the floor level up by 3/4" anyway. If your tile is glued to the vinyl, the permanent fix is to take everything up and start over. I guess I'm lucky that most of the idiot DIY moves in my house were electrical and plumbing-related. --Chuck From silvercreekvalley at yahoo.com Mon Mar 8 17:03:14 2010 From: silvercreekvalley at yahoo.com (silvercreekvalley) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 15:03:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: Rack rails Message-ID: <535268.88933.qm@web56207.mail.re3.yahoo.com> Does anyone have any rack rails for sale (uk) for a regular 19" rack? These don't need to be the sliding type just a basic L shape rail? Contact me of list if you have anything. They are tricky to find for a reasonable price Thanks Ian From spectre at floodgap.com Mon Mar 8 17:53:37 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 15:53:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: from William Donzelli at "Mar 8, 10 05:19:05 pm" Message-ID: <201003082353.o28NrbgJ013156@floodgap.com> > > I try dating occasionally. It is weird. > > > > ------------------------------- personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- > > Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com > > -- In memory of Bob Crane ------------------------------------------------ > > I understand that dates with Bob Crane did get kind of weird. He did always have this thing about his camera. And a Klink fetish I never understood. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Experience only makes you more interesting and marketable. -- Judy Blackburn (I actually did meet Howard Caine (Hochstetter) once before he died. He was a down home Tennessee country feller and played an exceptional banjo. He was also a really nice guy.) From healyzh at aracnet.com Mon Mar 8 18:28:26 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 16:28:26 -0800 (PST) Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: <0FE8F8F1-57CD-4393-905E-E863750F2831@neurotica.com> References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> <0FE8F8F1-57CD-4393-905E-E863750F2831@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 8 Mar 2010, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 8, 2010, at 4:20 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >> All old steam engines are worth saving. Most old computers are not. > > Urr? I think it's just the opposite. > > -Dave So we should ship all those x86 boxes no one wants to you? Zane From trixter at oldskool.org Mon Mar 8 18:40:36 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:40:36 -0600 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B959904.4040705@oldskool.org> On 3/8/2010 1:59 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> > That depelds on 'how far outsiode' they are... ^^ > engineeriong, mechancial/eletctrical/electronic repair, that sort of ^^ > artificial. For example (to keep thios on-topic), diagnosing and repairing ^^ Goodness, you've got IO on the brain! -- 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 Mon Mar 8 19:03:47 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 17:03:47 -0800 (PST) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100308165635.H87630@shell.lmi.net> > > > Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? > > I try dating occasionally. It is weird. On Mon, 8 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > What? With an MOTAS [1]? Fortunately (I guess) there are no such people > who wish to associate with somebody whose idea of a good time involves > machine tools... You have obviously never met Jeri Ellsworth. From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 8 20:52:23 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 21:52:23 -0500 Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> <0FE8F8F1-57CD-4393-905E-E863750F2831@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Mar 8, 2010, at 7:28 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >>> All old steam engines are worth saving. Most old computers are not. >> >> Urr? I think it's just the opposite. > > So we should ship all those x86 boxes no one wants to you? You know better than that. ;) Though I suppose it probably is fair to say that there are more (say) 80486 boxes out there than PDP-11s. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 8 20:59:16 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 21:59:16 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B957B38.4050702@arachelian.com> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B9569F7.1000107@arachelian.com> <4B95759B.9000708@jetnet.ab.ca> <4B957B38.4050702@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <7942B7F7-3B23-421C-A074-4CDA8199E409@neurotica.com> On Mar 8, 2010, at 5:33 PM, Ray Arachelian wrote: >>> Recently the tiles in my kitchen >>> started to rise and the grout from the sides started to loosen free. >>> That's the next project. I've no idea how to fix them, but >>> researching >>> that now. The hard part is I don't have any more spares, and since >>> they're so old the home depot will have non-matching ones. So if >>> I can >>> figure out how to completely loosen them out without breaking them, >>> I'd be very happy (they're still >>> sticking though somewhat wiggling) :-) Hey, if you've any >>> ideas on >>> how to fix'em or why they'd start rising up, I'm all ears. >>> >> You have checked for un-dead in your area ... right !? >> > > No, but I did hear a whisper in the middle of night, sounded something > like brrraaaaainnnnnzzzzzzzz, but I can't be sure. BRAINSSSS!! I downloaded that entire series of movies not long ago. I need to inflict them upon my defenseless girlfriend. She took Tampopo pretty well; she might just handle the zombies too. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Mon Mar 8 21:24:14 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:24:14 -0700 Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> <0FE8F8F1-57CD-4393-905E-E863750F2831@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4B95BF5E.2040109@jetnet.ab.ca> Zane H. Healy wrote: > > On Mon, 8 Mar 2010, Dave McGuire wrote: > >> On Mar 8, 2010, at 4:20 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >>> All old steam engines are worth saving. Most old computers are not. >> >> Urr? I think it's just the opposite. >> >> -Dave > > So we should ship all those x86 boxes no one wants to you? If he is real lucky, we can give him the buggy 586's too! [1] > Zane What scares me is that other than audio/video processing like in DVD and CD players and the odd console, has there been a real need for bloatware as today products claim to want. I still hen-peck at at same speed on a TTY as last years computer keyboard? Ben. 1] PS if we want to be real nasty, throw computers in the x86 boxes. From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Mon Mar 8 21:44:00 2010 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 19:44:00 -0800 (PST) Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: <4B95BF5E.2040109@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> <0FE8F8F1-57CD-4393-905E-E863750F2831@neurotica.com> <4B95BF5E.2040109@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: On Mon, 8 Mar 2010, Ben wrote: > Zane H. Healy wrote: >> >> On Mon, 8 Mar 2010, Dave McGuire wrote: >> >>> On Mar 8, 2010, at 4:20 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >>>> All old steam engines are worth saving. Most old computers are not. >>> >>> Urr? I think it's just the opposite. >>> >>> -Dave >> >> So we should ship all those x86 boxes no one wants to you? > > If he is real lucky, we can give him the buggy 586's too! > [1] >> Zane > What scares me is that other than audio/video processing like in DVD > and CD players and the odd console, has there been a real need for > bloatware as today products claim to want. I still hen-peck at at > same speed on a TTY as last years computer keyboard? > Ben. > 1] PS if we want to be real nasty, throw computers in the x86 boxes. I'll take your unwanted Model M keyboards. -- 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 healyzh at aracnet.com Mon Mar 8 21:48:03 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 19:48:03 -0800 Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> <0FE8F8F1-57CD-4393-905E-E863750F2831@neurotica.com> Message-ID: At 9:52 PM -0500 3/8/10, Dave McGuire wrote: >On Mar 8, 2010, at 7:28 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >>>>All old steam engines are worth saving. Most old computers are not. >>> >>> Urr? I think it's just the opposite. >> >>So we should ship all those x86 boxes no one wants to you? > > You know better than that. ;) > > Though I suppose it probably is fair to say that there are more >(say) 80486 boxes out there than PDP-11s. > > -Dave Now you see my point. :-) 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 healyzh at aracnet.com Mon Mar 8 21:59:00 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 19:59:00 -0800 Subject: rare and not-so rare systems available In-Reply-To: References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> <0FE8F8F1-57CD-4393-905E-E863750F2831@neurotica.com> <4B95BF5E.2040109@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: At 7:44 PM -0800 3/8/10, David Griffith wrote: >I'll take your unwanted Model M keyboards. Hehehe... I only have two, and they're among the very few Classic Computer items that I want to keep. Is anyone in Oregon looking for Classic Hardware? If so what. I'm looking to start selling off my collection. Though someone with a nice Leica (with lenses), or Hasselblad or Large Format Lenses might be able to score a good trade. Yes, this includes rare systems. Except for some PDP-11, VAX, Alpha, and Commodore gear I think I'm looking to unload most of my classic gear. The only computer I use at home any more is my Mac. I just don't have time or interest in Classic Computers any more. Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 paisley at erols.com Mon Mar 8 23:01:52 2010 From: paisley at erols.com (Todd Paisley) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 00:01:52 -0500 Subject: H960 Rack Doors References: <201002092131.o19LVrtx020610@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <6b5f01cabf45$a1e9e770$020a0a0a@cj2a> I am looking for some photos of the H960 rack doors. Also, does anyone have any H960 doors available? Thanks. Todd Paisley From useddec at gmail.com Mon Mar 8 23:35:58 2010 From: useddec at gmail.com (Paul Anderson) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 23:35:58 -0600 Subject: rare and not-so rare systems available In-Reply-To: References: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> <0FE8F8F1-57CD-4393-905E-E863750F2831@neurotica.com> <4B95BF5E.2040109@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <624966d61003082135s5a542793h2da856045fa2fc38@mail.gmail.com> I collect Zeiss equipment, and almost anything optical made brass. But a Hasselblad...hmmm. Paul On Mon, Mar 8, 2010 at 9:59 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > At 7:44 PM -0800 3/8/10, David Griffith wrote: > >> I'll take your unwanted Model M keyboards. >> > > Hehehe... I only have two, and they're among the very few Classic Computer > items that I want to keep. > > Is anyone in Oregon looking for Classic Hardware? If so what. I'm looking > to start selling off my collection. Though someone with a nice Leica (with > lenses), or Hasselblad or Large Format Lenses might be able to score a good > trade. > > Yes, this includes rare systems. Except for some PDP-11, VAX, Alpha, and > Commodore gear I think I'm looking to unload most of my classic gear. > > The only computer I use at home any more is my Mac. I just don't have time > or interest in Classic Computers any more. > > Zane > > > > -- > | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | > | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | > | | 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 useddec at gmail.com Mon Mar 8 23:38:05 2010 From: useddec at gmail.com (Paul Anderson) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 23:38:05 -0600 Subject: H960 Rack Doors In-Reply-To: <6b5f01cabf45$a1e9e770$020a0a0a@cj2a> References: <201002092131.o19LVrtx020610@floodgap.com> <6b5f01cabf45$a1e9e770$020a0a0a@cj2a> Message-ID: <624966d61003082138me5910aaka9598e2f9010dfe6@mail.gmail.com> Hi Todd, Front or rear, full or partial? Where are you located? Paul in Illinois On Mon, Mar 8, 2010 at 11:01 PM, Todd Paisley wrote: > I am looking for some photos of the H960 rack doors. Also, does anyone > have > any H960 doors available? Thanks. > > Todd Paisley > > From paisley at erols.com Tue Mar 9 00:04:20 2010 From: paisley at erols.com (Todd Paisley) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 01:04:20 -0500 Subject: H960 Rack Doors References: <201002092131.o19LVrtx020610@floodgap.com><6b5f01cabf45$a1e9e770$020a0a0a@cj2a> <624966d61003082138me5910aaka9598e2f9010dfe6@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6c0101cabf4e$5bea0c60$020a0a0a@cj2a> Hi Paul. I am located in Maryland. I am looking for the rear door. Thanks! Todd. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Paul Anderson" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Tuesday, March 09, 2010 12:38 AM Subject: Re: H960 Rack Doors > Hi Todd, > > Front or rear, full or partial? Where are you located? > > Paul > in Illinois > > On Mon, Mar 8, 2010 at 11:01 PM, Todd Paisley wrote: > > > I am looking for some photos of the H960 rack doors. Also, does anyone > > have > > any H960 doors available? Thanks. > > > > Todd Paisley > > > > From rodsmallwood at btconnect.com Tue Mar 9 00:51:03 2010 From: rodsmallwood at btconnect.com (Rod Smallwood) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 06:51:03 -0000 Subject: Northstar Horizion Message-ID: Wanted all parts (excluding motherboard) for a Northstar Horizon preferably in the UK. Specifically: Any suitable S100 boards (Northstar originals if possible) Case/Chassis SA400 Floppy Drives Fortunately I can get the right PSU capacitors and a new 2 x 8v + 1 x 15v transformer wound to order. Not original but safer. Rod Smallwood From steerex at ccvn.com Tue Mar 9 00:20:20 2010 From: steerex at ccvn.com (Steve Robertson) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 01:20:20 -0500 Subject: Anyone running RTE-M on an HP 21MX series M, E, or F? References: <4B92A153.6000408@cimmeri.com> Message-ID: <001701cabf50$9857a4d0$0301a8c0@win2k> > > It would also be great to hear what OSes folks are running on these, and > which version they like the best. > > Thanks very much, > John Singleton > Rockville, MD. > > Take a look at HP-IPL/OS. The link is http://www.infionline.net/~wtnewton/oldcomp/hp2100/index.html From charlesleecourtney at yahoo.com Mon Mar 8 12:46:14 2010 From: charlesleecourtney at yahoo.com (Lee Courtney) Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 10:46:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> Message-ID: <210520.25294.qm@web35308.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Yes, but only realize it is outside my comfort zone after I am well into the project... Lee Courtney ----- Original Message ---- From: Keith To: General at olddell.com.computerhistory.org; On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Sent: Mon, March 8, 2010 10:36:37 AM Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? While I think it is the right thing to do intellectually to expand my knowledge, I often think that I waste a lot of time trying to do fairly simple tasks in areas where I have limited knowledge or experience. I think challenges can be rewarding, and I enjoy them. "Anything worth doing is hard." I think is the phrase. I try to do the necessary research, background reading, start from the ground up before attempting to do anything. I still find that getting your hands in it, ie learning by doing, seems to help the process along. With all this being said, it sure is frustrating and the rewards come slowly. While I DO like instant gratification, I don't expect it. I do expect that the payoff, it terms of reward vs time spent is reasonable. As my available personal free time has been less and less lately, making sure that I'm not just wasting my time is important to me. Do you find that you spend most of your time on projects that are well within your knowledge and experience, or most of your time learning about new technology/skills/programming language/hardware/etc to facilitate accomplishing a new project? Thanks Keith From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Tue Mar 9 06:37:52 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 12:37:52 +0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> Keith wrote: > Do you find that you spend most of your time on projects that are well > within your knowledge and experience, or most of your time learning > about new technology/skills/programming language/hardware/etc to > facilitate accomplishing a new project? It's probably about a 60-40 split for me. Most of the time, if I want a quick solution to the problem, I'll get a Roadrunner pen and build up something out of parts in my junk box, that is, parts I've used before on other projects. This usually means I end up with some microprocessor-controlled monstrosity. There are exceptions -- I've spent the past couple of years learning about programmable logic. I started out with GALs, then moved onto Xilinx CPLDs (XC9500XL series), and have recently (as of mid-September last year) started playing with Altera FPGAs. Every time I've made the jump to something else, I've built something to help learn about that technology -- - GALs - 6502 computer. Nearly every board has a 16V8/QP for address decoding. - CPLDs - LCD controller for a PIC. A 16-bit data serialiser / timing generator to drive a small direct-drive LCD display panel. - FPGAs - the DiscFerret. At least this way I end up with something to show for my effort. And it's more fun :) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From stojoskij at ikomline.net Tue Mar 9 04:28:42 2010 From: stojoskij at ikomline.net (Jovica Stojoski) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 11:28:42 +0100 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? Message-ID: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> Hi, I need scematics of RGB to VGA converter. I want to connect Wheel Balancer machine to computer VGA monitor. Old monitor is VALVO VCC93/00 fixed frequency (15KHz) and have R, G, B and common Sync signals. I would be grateful if you can help me! Best regards, Jovica From steerex at ccvn.com Tue Mar 9 19:28:49 2010 From: steerex at ccvn.com (Steve Robertson) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 20:28:49 -0500 Subject: Wirewrap boards update Message-ID: <002401cabff1$0f493540$0301a8c0@win2k> Yo! I have posted a few pictures of the wirewrap boards that are offered. I haven't used this free service before so, I hope the links work OK for everyone. http://tinypic.com/r/2q0iovn/6 http://tinypic.com/r/whhb7o/6 http://tinypic.com/r/2cp97j5/6 http://tinypic.com/r/kaqkjl/6 http://tinypic.com/r/2ed1esm/6 http://tinypic.com/r/2chw679/6 My brain is getting kinda soft so, I mistakenly said the pins were on a .4" X .1" grid. That is not correct. They are on a .3" X .1" grid. So all the common DIP packages will plug right in. Sorry for any confusion. SteveRob steerex [at] ccvn [dot] com From brianlanning at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 09:20:47 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 09:20:47 -0600 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> References: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003090720h7d19f686rfddd18a344282d52@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 4:28 AM, Jovica Stojoski wrote: > Hi, > > I need scematics of RGB to VGA converter. > > I want to connect Wheel Balancer machine to computer VGA monitor. > > Old monitor is VALVO VCC93/00 fixed frequency (15KHz) and have R, G, B and > common Sync signals. > > I would be grateful if you can help me! > Amiga people have this exact problem all the time. There's a device called the ToastScan or something like that. They're dreadfully expensive on ebay. But you might be able to get the plans for it. It plugged into the RGB output on the back of the amiga and converted to VGA. A less elegant solution would be to find an old amiga 1084 (or similar) monitor. They're relatively cheap. It should be able to display the 15khz signal just fine. I know it's not a flat panel LCD though. brian From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Tue Mar 9 09:31:17 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:31:17 +0000 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> References: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> Message-ID: <4B9669C5.6060101@philpem.me.uk> Jovica Stojoski wrote: > I need scematics of RGB to VGA converter. > > I want to connect Wheel Balancer machine to computer VGA monitor. > > Old monitor is VALVO VCC93/00 fixed frequency (15KHz) and have R, G, B and > common Sync signals. > > I would be grateful if you can help me! This would seem to be WAY off topic even for cctalk, but hey-ho... Go find yourself a Microvitec Cub or Philips CM8833 monitor -- either of these should be easily obtainable for far less than a scan converter. There are other monitors that should work -- the Acorn AKF17, for instance, was a reboxed version of the CM8833, and dozens of other companies made CRT-type TV monitors. Converting from 15kHz fixed frequency to VGA (which has a line frequency of 31.5kHz) would most likely involve a triple A/D converter, a dual-ported frame buffer RAM, a triple D/A converter, and some form of timing controller (I'd probably use an FPGA with an internal PLL -- use the PLL to double the line rate of the incoming signal). Another option might be an TV with a SCART input -- wire your RGB and sync signals to a SCART plug, then plug those into the TV. Quality isn't going to be particularly stellar, though, especially on a cheap TFT monitor. The CM8833 et al were all designed as computer monitors, and are far better suited to displaying text and graphics. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From js at cimmeri.com Tue Mar 9 09:46:17 2010 From: js at cimmeri.com (js at cimmeri.com) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 10:46:17 -0500 Subject: OT: for Christian Corti Message-ID: <4B966D49.2070608@cimmeri.com> Christian, received your email fine but still unable to reply. Here's the kind of errors I'm receiving, even with different email addresses: ---------------------------------------- A message that you sent could not be delivered to one or more of its recipients. This is a permanent error. The following address(es) failed: corticn at zdi2.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (generated from cc at corti-net.de ) SMTP error from remote mail server after RCPT TO:>: host mailgw.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de [129.69.211.42]: 554 5.7.1 >: Sender address rejected: Access denied ---------------------------------------- Hi. This is the qmail-send program at mail2.sea5.speakeasy.net. I'm afraid I wasn't able to deliver your message to the following addresses. : 129.69.211.41 does not acknowledge recipient. Remote host said: 554 5.7.1 : Sender address rejected: Access denied Giving up on 129.69.211.41. - John Singleton From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 9 11:10:19 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 09:10:19 -0800 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> References: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> Message-ID: <4B96107B.11983.B4FFF@cclist.sydex.com> On 9 Mar 2010 at 11:28, Jovica Stojoski wrote: > Old monitor is VALVO VCC93/00 fixed frequency (15KHz) and have R, G, B > and common Sync signals. Chinese converters are available from a number of sources for a very reasonable price. Consider, for example, eBay item 250593765979. --Chuck From ragooman at comcast.net Tue Mar 9 11:50:13 2010 From: ragooman at comcast.net (Dan Roganti) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 12:50:13 -0500 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> References: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> Message-ID: <4B968A55.90706@comcast.net> Jovica Stojoski wrote: > Hi, > > I need scematics of RGB to VGA converter. > we use one of these, it's almost universal , RGB/CGA/EGA/YUV to VGA Converter more details on the website http://www.jammaboards.com/store/cga/ega/yuv-to-vga-converter-pcb-gbs-8220/prod_291.html only $50 =Dan From keithvz at verizon.net Tue Mar 9 14:06:26 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:06:26 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B959904.4040705@oldskool.org> References: <4B959904.4040705@oldskool.org> Message-ID: <4B96AA42.1050706@verizon.net> Jim Leonard wrote: > On 3/8/2010 1:59 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >>> >> That depelds on 'how far outsiode' they are... > ^^ >> engineeriong, mechancial/eletctrical/electronic repair, that sort of > ^^ >> artificial. For example (to keep thios on-topic), diagnosing and >> repairing > ^^ > > Goodness, you've got IO on the brain! Yo Trixta', Are you coming to BlOcK PaRtY 2010 in Cleveland? Keith From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 9 13:32:30 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 19:32:30 +0000 (GMT) Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: <4B9563CB.5090106@snarc.net> from "Evan Koblentz" at Mar 8, 10 03:53:31 pm Message-ID: > > Guys, don't confuse "rare" with "more historic". "Rare" just means > "fewer". If the people at Tandy produced a limited-edition TRS-80, and > the only difference was it had a yellow polka-dot case design, and only > 100 were ever made, does that mean it's more "rare" than a Straight-8? > Technically, yes! Does that make it more historic? It's too dumb a > question to even ask. Oh, I agree with you totally. But I interpretted the original message as saying that a straight-8 should seel for more than an Apple 1 becuase it's rarer. I am simply arguing that rarity is not the major factor in determining price (and nor, IMHO should it be). One thing that certainly doesn't correlate with price is quality (either design quality of build quality). This is obvious from the fact that a Sinclair ZX80 will sell for a lot more than a contemporary HP machine... > > (I'm not putting down the PERQ systems, etc.; those are certainly > historic in their own regard.) Actually, nrither of those PERQs is particulalry historic. Th PERQ 2T4 is the last of the classic PERQs, and the only one with a 24 bit (rather than 20 bit) processor. The AGW3300 is an ICL-designed 68020 unix box, albeit one with a curious graphics procesosr (a pair of 29116s, one to calculate adresses, the other to update the bitmap data). I would claim the really historic PERQ is the original PERQ 1 (with a 4K WCS CPU), since that was the _first_. Mine is upstairs... It's not a particularly rare machine > > And yes, DEC isn't as popular as Apple; there won't be millions of DEC > fanboys and stuff ...... > > But it's hard to argue that the Straight-8 isn't one of the most * > historic * systems ever made, re: historic = grand context and > importance to the history of the computer industry. Rarity is a big > factor too, but the '8 has it all. Historic, rare, desirable. I won't argue about the 'historic' or 'rare', but is it particularly desirable (for reasons other than being historic and rare)? I would have thought a later PDP8 machine, such ad a PDP8/e was more desirable technically (it can take more memory, it uses more common logic levels, there are more peripherals for it (and they're easier to find), it uses TTL logic levels (so it's easier to make your own interfaces, and so on). -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 9 14:08:12 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 20:08:12 +0000 (GMT) Subject: rare and not-so rare systems available In-Reply-To: <624966d61003082135s5a542793h2da856045fa2fc38@mail.gmail.com> from "Paul Anderson" at Mar 8, 10 11:35:58 pm Message-ID: > > I collect Zeiss equipment, and almost anything optical made brass. But a Would you believe a freind of mine nearly threw out a Zeiss microscope. Fairly modern, binocular eeyepieces, but one objective (and a beam splitter), so you don't get stereoscopic views of the object. It's still a very nice instrument... Notice I said 'nearly threw out'. I grabbed it... I must be the only person who when asked to recomend a medium format camera (price not being a criterion) didn't recomend a 'blad.... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 9 13:52:05 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 19:52:05 +0000 (GMT) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: <4B9569F7.1000107@arachelian.com> from "Ray Arachelian" at Mar 8, 10 04:19:51 pm Message-ID: > Depends on how much the reward is worth, and what other things would > your rather spend your time with. If you want instant gratification, > pay someone else to do it - if it's something that can be done by WHile paying somebody else to do it might well get you quicker results or not... Flanders and Swann 'The Gas Man Cometh' and its filk 'The DEC Man Comet' spring to mind...), i don't think that provides any real graticfication at all. I much prefer the sense of achivement that comes from solving the problem and doing a proper job myself. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 9 13:48:53 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 19:48:53 +0000 (GMT) Subject: rare systems In-Reply-To: <4B956F36.1060305@snarc.net> from "Evan Koblentz" at Mar 8, 10 04:42:14 pm Message-ID: > LOL .... for the purpose of * acquiring * systems, we all want prices to > go * down *, right? But for the purpose of our personal (and in my > case, museum) collections, we want prices to go up. Quite a dilemma. I get the first part of that, but I can't understand why it's desirable for the prices of machines I already own to go up. I don't intend to sell said machines, I certainly didn'y buy them as an investment. And they jsut as mauch fun to restore and use no matter what they would sell for. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 9 13:56:34 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 19:56:34 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Rack rails In-Reply-To: <535268.88933.qm@web56207.mail.re3.yahoo.com> from "silvercreekvalley" at Mar 8, 10 03:03:14 pm Message-ID: > > > Does anyone have any rack rails for sale (uk) for a regular 19" rack? > These don't need to be the sliding type just a basic L shape rail? > > Contact me of list if you have anything. They are tricky to find for a > reasonable price How about buying soem metal angle, hacsawing it to length and drilling a couple of mounting holes? -tony From wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 14:20:27 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 15:20:27 -0500 Subject: DECwriters Message-ID: Curious... Who here has a DECwriter I (LA30)? This is the original early 70s DECwriter made out of Flip Chips. Google for a picture. Who here would like a DECwriter I? No, I am not selling, just curious... -- Will From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 14:28:06 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:28:06 -0500 Subject: rare and not-so rare systems available In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B96AF56.6050208@gmail.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> I collect Zeiss equipment, and almost anything optical made brass. But a > > Would you believe a freind of mine nearly threw out a Zeiss microscope. > Fairly modern, binocular eeyepieces, but one objective (and a beam > splitter), so you don't get stereoscopic views of the object. It's still > a very nice instrument... > > Notice I said 'nearly threw out'. I grabbed it... > > I must be the only person who when asked to recomend a medium format > camera (price not being a criterion) didn't recomend a 'blad.... Money no object, I wouldn't suggest Hasselblad either. I'd probably suggest a medium format Sinar railcam, or something like it. Peace... Sridhar From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Tue Mar 9 14:39:38 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 20:39:38 +0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B96B20A.5000604@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: > WHile paying somebody else to do it might well get you quicker results > or not... Flanders and Swann 'The Gas Man Cometh' and its filk 'The DEC > Man Comet' spring to mind...), i don't think that provides any real > graticfication at all. I much prefer the sense of achivement that comes > from solving the problem and doing a proper job myself. I think you've summed it up pretty well there. It's more fun to learn how to do something, then do it, than it is to give Joe Bloggs down the street a fiver to do it. There are certain exceptions... if I needed some mechanical component machining I'd probably look for a local machine shop and ask them (my metalworking "skills" are sub-par at best -- I can drill holes in metal equipment panels without damaging myself or my cheap little cordless drill, but that's about it). And as far as I'm concerned repairing things is a no-lose game -- I'll either not be able to fix it (in which case I'm still in the same situation I was at the start) or I'll fix it and finish up minus a few spare parts, but ahead one working $ITEM... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Tue Mar 9 14:43:10 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 20:43:10 +0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update Message-ID: <4B96B2DE.1050809@philpem.me.uk> Hi guys, Quick update regarding the disc analyser... Latest news is: * The USB interface is now running properly at full speed. Write-to-buffer has gone from 84Kbytes/sec to over 180 with two small firmware tweaks. Read speed is a little under 250Kbytes/sec, which means the entire 512K buffer can be read out in a shade over two seconds. It's not going to win me any awards, but I think it's plenty fast enough. * It Has A Name! One of my friends suggested "DiscFerret" partly as a slight dig at the Catweasel. The name has stuck to the point where I've... um... registered a .com domain name for it... (hey, it only cost ?12). I'll be setting up the site as soon as I find a nice Wiki package that isn't bloated to the size of a small main-sequence star (*koff* Mediawiki). * Schematics are basically done. I need to test the power supply section, which is on the to-do list for a bit later on. Soldering down the QFN-packaged power regulator IC will be interesting. * There's an external power output for disc drives. It provides +12V at 1.5A and +5V at 1.5A. Perfect for running small 3.5in drives, and saves a mains socket. Haven't decided on a connector, but the +12 is fed directly from the input power supply, so if you connect a 15V PSU you'll see 15V on the EPS output. * Power supply can accept between 9 and 15V, though it is specified to operate with peak efficiency at approx. 12V. Input is reverse-polarity protected with a grounded-gate low-Rds(on) MOSFET. I'll probably be building up a prototype power supply board tonight or tomorrow, and giving that a good beating with a homebrew DC load. I think I've got some MJE3055s and trimpots somewhere, though whether they'll work with Vce=1.2V remains to be seen (I suspect a MOSFET might work better). But first I need to get my paws on some 0.5mm carbide drill bits. There are a couple of vias on that board that are in a really tight spot... I make no secret of the fact that it was designed to be commercially manufactured, not haphazardly assembled by some semi-skilled engineering student in a garden shed (i.e. me!) The plan for those is to drill out the holes, push in a resistor leg flush with one side, solder on one side, cut and file flush on the other side, then solder that side too. I figure that should be a tight enough fit that the wire won't be going anywhere... and if that doesn't work there's always 26SWG tinned copper wire. Cheers, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 9 15:01:19 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 16:01:19 -0500 Subject: DECwriters In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3C071F5D-48B6-425C-B5B6-C19594054718@neurotica.com> On Mar 9, 2010, at 3:20 PM, William Donzelli wrote: > Curious... > > Who here has a DECwriter I (LA30)? This is the original early 70s > DECwriter made out of Flip Chips. Google for a picture. Not me. :-( > Who here would like a DECwriter I? > > No, I am not selling, just curious... Oh, I'd definitely drool over such a device. I've typed on no end of LA34s, LA36s, and LA120s, but never an LA30. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 15:07:22 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 16:07:22 -0500 Subject: DECwriters In-Reply-To: <3C071F5D-48B6-425C-B5B6-C19594054718@neurotica.com> References: <3C071F5D-48B6-425C-B5B6-C19594054718@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 4:01 PM, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 9, 2010, at 3:20 PM, William Donzelli wrote: >> Curious... >> >> Who here has a DECwriter I (LA30)? This is the original early 70s >> DECwriter made out of Flip Chips. Google for a picture. > > ?Not me. :-( > >> Who here would like a DECwriter I? >> >> No, I am not selling, just curious... > > ?Oh, I'd definitely drool over such a device. ?I've typed on no end of LA34s, LA36s, and LA120s, but never an LA30. Agreed - I have run miles of paper through the common models of teleprinters, but have never seen an LA30 up close. -ethan From keithvz at verizon.net Tue Mar 9 15:30:00 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 16:30:00 -0500 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <4B968A55.90706@comcast.net> References: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> <4B968A55.90706@comcast.net> Message-ID: <4B96BDD8.80301@verizon.net> Dan Roganti wrote: > Jovica Stojoski wrote: >> Hi, >> >> I need scematics of RGB to VGA converter. >> > > we use one of these, it's almost universal , RGB/CGA/EGA/YUV to VGA > Converter > more details on the website > http://www.jammaboards.com/store/cga/ega/yuv-to-vga-converter-pcb-gbs-8220/prod_291.html > > only $50 > > =Dan > Dan, Interesting to note this is the same product mentioned by Chuck in the previous post (aka eBay item 250593765979) Has anyone tried this with their amigas? I've been interesting in getting one of these for quite some time. Keith From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Tue Mar 9 13:49:37 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 19:49:37 -0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> Message-ID: <010201cabfd1$b329c690$edfdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Considering that I have never been on a programming course and have entirely tought myself from books and examining code, I would say that I mostly stick to what I know and only learn new stuff (coding techniques, new languages etc.) when I have to. In the last 5 years that includes compression (LZW and RTE/RLE), complements (2, 9 and 10), the .BMP format (urgh, why have it all upside down and back to front deliberately!), BCD numbers, CSV files and various other things. I admit I don't like learning new languages, because it is a lot of hassle in the beginning. Once I have mastered the basics it does become alot easier and much more fun. I usually have a programming manual sat beside me to remind me of syntax and to look-up commands that I know exist but can't remember the exact name of (AMOS Basic/AMOS Pro for the Amiga has around 1000 official commands, plus around 1000 more commands made by AMOS enthusiasts).[1] Motorola 68000 ASM was very easy to pick up and understand, but I am still learning techniques to make my code more efficient :) I learnt the in's and out's of Windows from the beta version of Windows '95 whilst at work experience in 1995, a bit more whilst doing a DTP course in 1997/8 (which got me my NVQ level 2 in computers) and the rest I have picked up from various versions of Windows used at work. Though I have learnt about the workings of Windows (registry and executables) from my own experiences with my laptop, which I got in Feb 2007. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk [1] Don't confuse AMOS (Amiga OS), written by Francios Lionet for Mandarin Software/Europress, with the other AMOS which I have seen mentioned on this list. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Keith" To: ; "Discussion at olddell.com :On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Monday, March 08, 2010 6:36 PM Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? > Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? > > While I think it is the right thing to do intellectually to expand my > knowledge, I often think that I waste a lot of time trying to do fairly > simple tasks in areas where I have limited knowledge or experience. > > I think challenges can be rewarding, and I enjoy them. "Anything worth > doing is hard." I think is the phrase. > > I try to do the necessary research, background reading, start from the > ground up before attempting to do anything. I still find that getting > your hands in it, ie learning by doing, seems to help the process along. > > With all this being said, it sure is frustrating and the rewards come > slowly. While I DO like instant gratification, I don't expect it. I do > expect that the payoff, it terms of reward vs time spent is reasonable. > As my available personal free time has been less and less lately, > making sure that I'm not just wasting my time is important to me. > > Do you find that you spend most of your time on projects that are well > within your knowledge and experience, or most of your time learning > about new technology/skills/programming language/hardware/etc to > facilitate accomplishing a new project? > > Thanks > > Keith From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Tue Mar 9 14:33:14 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 20:33:14 -0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort References: <20100308165635.H87630@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <010301cabfd1$b4f29fb0$edfdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Speaking of Jeri, have you guys seen her latest video (posted earlier today) on YouTube? Rocket Candy-Canes! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjIxYQAO8Pk The pinball video (with speed camera) is another memorable video of hers, but my favourite at the moment is the one where she had a high speed camera (1200 FPS) and deliberately wired up 2 electrolytic capicators the wrong way to make them explode. One had the 'Y' indents on the top and the other didn't. Suffice to say, the 'Y' one smoked before exploding and the other one just went with a big bang! :) Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk ----- Original Message ----- From: "Fred Cisin" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Tuesday, March 09, 2010 1:03 AM Subject: Re: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort > > > > Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? > > > I try dating occasionally. It is weird. > > On Mon, 8 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > > What? With an MOTAS [1]? Fortunately (I guess) there are no such people > > who wish to associate with somebody whose idea of a good time involves > > machine tools... > > You have obviously never met Jeri Ellsworth. > > > > From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 9 15:51:55 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 21:51:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: <4B96B20A.5000604@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 9, 10 08:39:38 pm Message-ID: > It's more fun to learn how to do something, then do it, than it is to Exactly... > give Joe Bloggs down the street a fiver to do it. > > There are certain exceptions... if I needed some mechanical component > machining I'd probably look for a local machine shop and ask them (my You are lucky to have a 'local machine shop'/ There are, AFAIK, no such places round here. > metalworking "skills" are sub-par at best -- I can drill holes in metal > equipment panels without damaging myself or my cheap little cordless > drill, but that's about it). In which case you should follow your own advice and teach yourself metalwork. I still have a lot to learm, and like many things it needs a lot of practice, but I find it very enjoyable. And being able to make spacers, rollers, pulleys, cpindles, etc certainly makes some repairs a lot easier... [Silly example/ I was cleaning up an old Epson printer nad dropped a plastic bush from the paper feed mechansim. I looked for it for over an hour and couldn't find it (I've still not found it). In the end I grabbed a bit of brass rod and turned a suitable replacemnt in a few minutes...] > And as far as I'm concerned repairing things is a no-lose game -- I'll > either not be able to fix it (in which case I'm still in the same > situation I was at the start) or I'll fix it and finish up minus a few > spare parts, but ahead one working $ITEM... I never really give up. If I can't do a repair now, due to lack of skills or parts (particularly custom parts), I put the thing aside and come back to it in perhaps a few years. And many times I manage it then (having got more experience, etc). -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 9 16:02:22 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 22:02:22 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B96B2DE.1050809@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 9, 10 08:43:10 pm Message-ID: > The plan for those is to drill out the holes, push in a resistor leg=20 > flush with one side, solder on one side, cut and file flush on the other=20 > side, then solder that side too. I figure that should be a tight enough=20 > fit that the wire won't be going anywhere... and if that doesn't work=20 > there's always 26SWG tinned copper wire. I find (stripped) wire-wrap wire to be useful for this sort of thing. It's thin, and soldered easily. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 9 16:04:02 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 22:04:02 +0000 (GMT) Subject: DECwriters In-Reply-To: <3C071F5D-48B6-425C-B5B6-C19594054718@neurotica.com> from "Dave McGuire" at Mar 9, 10 04:01:19 pm Message-ID: > > Curious... > >=20 > > Who here has a DECwriter I (LA30)? This is the original early 70s > > DECwriter made out of Flip Chips. Google for a picture. > > Not me. :-( Nor me. This is the one with the swing-out frame of flip-chips in the stand, isn't it? I am pretty sure I have the printset for it somewhere, but not the machine. > > > Who here would like a DECwriter I? > >=20 > > No, I am not selling, just curious... > > Oh, I'd definitely drool over such a device. I've typed on no end of = > LA34s, LA36s, and LA120s, but never an LA30. I've never seen one either. I gurss I would like one, but where the heck would I put it :-)... -tony From hachti at hachti.de Tue Mar 9 16:09:28 2010 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 23:09:28 +0100 Subject: DECwriters In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B96C718.4020901@hachti.de> > Who here has a DECwriter I (LA30)? Not yet. > Who here would like a DECwriter I? I would appreciate one. It nicely fits the VT05... -- http://www.hachti.de From doc at vaxen.net Tue Mar 9 16:53:20 2010 From: doc at vaxen.net (Doc Shipley) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 16:53:20 -0600 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B96D160.7030200@vaxen.net> On 3/8/10 12:36 PM, Keith wrote: > Do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? > > While I think it is the right thing to do intellectually to expand my > knowledge, I often think that I waste a lot of time trying to do fairly > simple tasks in areas where I have limited knowledge or experience. > > I think challenges can be rewarding, and I enjoy them. "Anything worth > doing is hard." I think is the phrase. "Anything worth doing is worth doing wrong." I struck a match to a propane burner Friday that I built from a bunch of plumbing parts. While it's pretty close to a well-proven design and I regularly play with that kind of fire, I've never built my own. If anything, lifelong association with cutting & welding torches made this project even more scary. Lighting it the first time literally made my sphincter cramp. It worked, and my garage still has its roof. :) To me, "wasting time" is a very subjective phrase. I could have gone to the local potter's supply and bought a commercial version of this for ~$100, and I have probably 20 hours of research, parts shopping, and fiddling in the one I built. In a purely monetary sense, I lost out big-time making my own. However, every time I light the thing I'll get a little "I DID THAT!" thrill, and a little chuckle at how nervous I was about testing my own work. See Also: HOBBY(n) - that which one does for entertainment, usually at great cost. Doc From segin2005 at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 16:53:46 2010 From: segin2005 at gmail.com (Kirn Gill) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 17:53:46 -0500 Subject: Old books, mostly UNIX books Message-ID: <5a4d65ae1003091453i6d9ef9b9sf78d8eb25c62a98f@mail.gmail.com> I've got a number of old UNIX books that I need to get rid of soon. Books I have: The Waite Group's UNIX? Primer Plus (Sams Publishing) ISBN 0-672-22729-0 Introduction To UNIX? (QUE Publishing) ISBN 0-88022-745-1 QuickBASIC Programmer's Toolkit (QUE Publishing) ISBN 0-88022-450-9 UNIX? Programmer's Reference (QUE Publishing) ISBN 0-88022-536-X UNIX? Networking (Hayden Books) ISBN 0-672-48440-4 Exploring the UNIX? System, Second Edition (Hayden Books) ISBN 0-672-48447-1 EXAM CRAM TCP/IP for MCSE (Certification Insider Press) ISBN 1-57610-476-1 All ISBN codes reported exactly as they appear on the physical books themselves. Abnormal or non-compliant hyphenation is therefore the fault of the publisher. "QuickBASIC Programmer's Toolkit" includes a 5.25" floppy disk. The disk is in near-perfect condition (visually), with the only noticeable issue is that the disk label has lost it's adhesiveness. Unknown whether it is 360K or 1.2M. Whoever takes this book, I request that you image this disk for me. Something mountable using a loopback device, please, no DOS Teledisk format or whatever. Please reply either on or off list. Shipping location is Gibsonton, Florida, United States of America. Zip/Postal is 33534. I have to get rid of these by Saturday. I don't want to have to garbage them if someone will take them. From glen.slick at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 17:20:39 2010 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 15:20:39 -0800 Subject: ACM Turing Award Goes to Creator of First Modern Personal Computer Message-ID: <1e1fc3e91003091520t7d04a468o586207543b5d0582@mail.gmail.com> Saw this in the news today: http://www.acm.org/press-room/news-releases/2010/turing-award-09/ NEW YORK, March 9, 2010 ? ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery today named Charles P. Thacker the winner of the 2009 ACM A.M. Turing Award http://awards.acm.org/2010/turing-award.cfm for his pioneering design and realization of the Alto, the first modern personal computer, and the prototype for networked personal computers. Thacker?s design, which he built while at Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center), reflected a new vision of a self-sufficient, networked computer on every desk, equipped with innovations that are standard in today?s models. Thacker was also cited for his contributions to the Ethernet local area network, which enables multiple computers to communicate and share resources, as well as the first multiprocessor workstation, and the prototype for today?s most used tablet PC, with its capabilities for direct user interaction. The Turing Award, widely considered the ?Nobel Prize in Computing,? is named for the British mathematician Alan M. Turing. The award carries a $250,000 prize, with financial support provided by Intel Corporation and Google Inc. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 17:26:16 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 18:26:16 -0500 Subject: DECwriters In-Reply-To: <4B96C718.4020901@hachti.de> References: <4B96C718.4020901@hachti.de> Message-ID: On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 5:09 PM, Philipp Hachtmann wrote: >> Who here would like a DECwriter I? > > I would appreciate one. It nicely fits the VT05... I haven't seen one of those except in photos, either. -ethan From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Tue Mar 9 17:53:09 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 23:53:09 +0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B96DF65.7090308@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: >> The plan for those is to drill out the holes, push in a resistor leg=20 >> flush with one side, solder on one side, cut and file flush on the other=20 >> side, then solder that side too. I figure that should be a tight enough=20 >> fit that the wire won't be going anywhere... and if that doesn't work=20 >> there's always 26SWG tinned copper wire. > > I find (stripped) wire-wrap wire to be useful for this sort of thing. > It's thin, and soldered easily. I think I've got some of that (though I'll be buggered if I can remember where it is). 40AWG with either blue or green insulation, IIRC. Really thin stuff. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From segin2005 at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 18:03:35 2010 From: segin2005 at gmail.com (Kirn Gill) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 19:03:35 -0500 Subject: Old books, mostly UNIX books In-Reply-To: <201003091837.13316.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <5a4d65ae1003091453i6d9ef9b9sf78d8eb25c62a98f@mail.gmail.com> <201003091837.13316.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <5a4d65ae1003091603s5be1d4s163ff6c7495e1d58@mail.gmail.com> I want $5 + shipping per book; I'll try to minimize shipping costs by shipping all the books together. As for publishing years: The Waite Group's UNIX? Primer Plus 1991 Introduction To UNIX? 1992 QuickBASIC Programmer's Toolkit 1989 UNIX? Programmer's Reference 1992 UNIX? Networking 1991 Exploring the UNIX? System, Second Edition 1991 EXAM CRAM TCP/IP for MCSE 1999 Also, I did not originally list this book: UNIX? Shell Commands: Quick Reference (QUE Publishing) ISBN 0-88022-572-6 1992 On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 18:37, Roy J. Tellason, Sr. wrote: > > What years were they published? That would help. Too, you don't say what > you'd want for them? > > -- > 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 Tue Mar 9 18:06:08 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 16:06:08 -0800 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B96DF65.7090308@philpem.me.uk> References: , <4B96DF65.7090308@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4B9671F0.11711.187FEA5@cclist.sydex.com> On 9 Mar 2010 at 23:53, Philip Pemberton wrote: > I think I've got some of that (though I'll be buggered if I can > remember where it is). 40AWG with either blue or green insulation, > IIRC. Really thin stuff. AWG 30, if it's the type used for electronics. Telco uses something like AWG 26 or thicker, if memory serves. Wire-wrap wire is usually silver-plated so it solder-wets very well. --Chuck From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Tue Mar 9 18:16:36 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 16:16:36 -0800 Subject: Disc analyser news update References: <4B96DF65.7090308@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4B96E4E4.1CC6EE7D@cs.ubc.ca> Philip Pemberton wrote: > > Tony Duell wrote: > >> The plan for those is to drill out the holes, push in a resistor leg=20 > >> flush with one side, solder on one side, cut and file flush on the other=20 > >> side, then solder that side too. I figure that should be a tight enough=20 > >> fit that the wire won't be going anywhere... and if that doesn't work=20 > >> there's always 26SWG tinned copper wire. > > > > I find (stripped) wire-wrap wire to be useful for this sort of thing. > > It's thin, and soldered easily. > > I think I've got some of that (though I'll be buggered if I can remember > where it is). 40AWG with either blue or green insulation, IIRC. Really > thin stuff. #40 is really, really thin (<0.08 mm, ~0.003in), only likely to be used for winding coils. I was rewinding a coil with #38 a couple weeks ago, not much latitude for indelicate slip-ups. From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 9 18:21:11 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 19:21:11 -0500 Subject: Old books, mostly UNIX books In-Reply-To: <5a4d65ae1003091453i6d9ef9b9sf78d8eb25c62a98f@mail.gmail.com> References: <5a4d65ae1003091453i6d9ef9b9sf78d8eb25c62a98f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: I'll rescue any leftovers. (and can pick them up) Are you moving or something? -Dave On Mar 9, 2010, at 5:53 PM, Kirn Gill wrote: > I've got a number of old UNIX books that I need to get rid of soon. > > Books I have: > > The Waite Group's UNIX? Primer Plus (Sams Publishing) ISBN > 0-672-22729-0 > Introduction To UNIX? (QUE Publishing) ISBN > 0-88022-745-1 > QuickBASIC Programmer's Toolkit (QUE Publishing) ISBN > 0-88022-450-9 > UNIX? Programmer's Reference (QUE Publishing) ISBN > 0-88022-536-X > UNIX? Networking (Hayden Books) ISBN > 0-672-48440-4 > Exploring the UNIX? System, Second Edition (Hayden Books) ISBN > 0-672-48447-1 > EXAM CRAM TCP/IP for MCSE (Certification Insider Press) > ISBN 1-57610-476-1 > > All ISBN codes reported exactly as they appear on the physical books > themselves. Abnormal or non-compliant hyphenation is therefore the fault of > the publisher. > > "QuickBASIC Programmer's Toolkit" includes a 5.25" floppy disk. The disk is > in near-perfect condition (visually), with the only noticeable issue is that > the disk label has lost it's adhesiveness. Unknown whether it is 360K or > 1.2M. Whoever takes this book, I request that you image this disk for me. > Something mountable using a loopback device, please, no DOS Teledisk format > or whatever. > > Please reply either on or off list. Shipping location is Gibsonton, Florida, > United States of America. Zip/Postal is 33534. > > I have to get rid of these by Saturday. I don't want to have to garbage them > if someone will take them. -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From hachti at hachti.de Tue Mar 9 18:23:34 2010 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 01:23:34 +0100 Subject: DECwriters In-Reply-To: References: <4B96C718.4020901@hachti.de> Message-ID: <4B96E686.5010309@hachti.de> >> I would appreciate one. It nicely fits the VT05... > > I haven't seen one of those except in photos, either. But they exist... I've never seen an LA30 - and don't know anyone having one. I've seen masses of DECwriter II, III, and IV - more that's worth keeping - but not one single LA30. -- http://www.hachti.de From lynchaj at yahoo.com Tue Mar 9 18:32:37 2010 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 19:32:37 -0500 Subject: Adding VGA, PS/2 keyboard, and microSD to generic Z80 CPU classic computers Message-ID: <711EFBD9028842B2A83E959A77A3B631@andrewdesktop> Hi! I am working with one of the N8VEM builders to make an interface to allow a generic Z80 CPU computer (DIP 40 socket) to interface to the N8VEM PropIO board. The benefit of this would be that any Z80 computer with a DIP 40 socket could add VGA, PS/2 keyboard, and microSD capability. I think this would be helpful for debugging and also transferring data from legacy platforms. http://groups.google.com/group/n8vem/msg/b287ef9fbe0f1e8d Since the board plugs directly into the Z80 CPU socket it is independent of any particular bus. Any new installation would require custom software for the platform. It appears the KayPro can access the PropIO using MBASIC so writing software should be practical. In theory, this approach may be applicable to any of the N8VEM ECB peripheral boards (Disk IO, VDU, prototyping board, etc). The concept may be applicable to other CPUs with the appropriate shim socket PCBs. I believe this could be particularly helpful for classic computers that lack an active development community. If anyone is interested in doing some experimentation with your vintage Z80 computer please contact me. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Tue Mar 9 18:43:46 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 00:43:46 +0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B96EB42.20302@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: >> There are certain exceptions... if I needed some mechanical component >> machining I'd probably look for a local machine shop and ask them (my > > You are lucky to have a 'local machine shop'/ There are, AFAIK, no such > places round here. There's an engineering company in Huddersfield (Pennine Radio) that does sheet-metal and machining work. I'm toying with the idea of asking them for a quote on doing the CNC work on the DiscFerret front/rear panels. If I had a CNC rig I'd do it myself, but the idea of drilling out the front panels for even a small production run does not appeal to me... > [Silly example/ I was cleaning up an old Epson printer nad dropped a > plastic bush from the paper feed mechansim. I looked for it for over an > hour and couldn't find it (I've still not found it). In the end I grabbed > a bit of brass rod and turned a suitable replacemnt in a few minutes...] Knowing Epson kit, that "non-factory replacement part" (GRIN) will probably outlast the rest of the printer. The last two Epsons I had (a C84 and a C86) both died from Blocked Print-head Syndrome. The ink dries in the head, then when the piezo actuators are triggered on power up for the "cleaning" cycle, they break/blow. Ugh. I've since switched to a colour laser printer (Kyocera FS-C5200dn) for most things, and only keep an inkjet around (Canon iP4600) for PCB transparencies and the occasional photo print (I've got a shelf full of JetStar Premium film and Canon ink cartridges and I'll be damned if I'm not going to use them!). Somehow, even if I leave the iP4600 for months, it always works when I come back to it... > I never really give up. If I can't do a repair now, due to lack of skills > or parts (particularly custom parts), I put the thing aside and come back > to it in perhaps a few years. And many times I manage it then (having got > more experience, etc). If I did that, I'd most likely be living in a Mr Trebus-style clutter-pit within the year. (for anyone that doesn't get the reference: look up a 1999 BBC TV series called "A Life of Grime") -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From brain at jbrain.com Tue Mar 9 18:43:59 2010 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 18:43:59 -0600 Subject: Adding VGA, PS/2 keyboard, and microSD to generic Z80 CPU classic computers In-Reply-To: <711EFBD9028842B2A83E959A77A3B631@andrewdesktop> References: <711EFBD9028842B2A83E959A77A3B631@andrewdesktop> Message-ID: <4B96EB4F.7090400@jbrain.com> On 3/9/2010 6:32 PM, Andrew Lynch wrote: > Hi! > > > > I am working with one of the N8VEM builders to make an interface to allow a > generic Z80 CPU computer (DIP 40 socket) to interface to the N8VEM PropIO > board. The benefit of this would be that any Z80 computer with a DIP 40 > socket could add VGA, PS/2 keyboard, and microSD capability. I think this > would be helpful for debugging and also transferring data from legacy > platforms. > > The idea is impressive, but that PCB is huge. Any chance the design could be made smaller? 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 paisley at erols.com Tue Mar 9 18:43:47 2010 From: paisley at erols.com (Todd Paisley) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 19:43:47 -0500 Subject: PDP-11 Color Codes References: <711EFBD9028842B2A83E959A77A3B631@andrewdesktop> Message-ID: Does anyone know the CYMK or RGB color codes for the PDP-11 rack header? This is the maroon/purple color scheme. The one on my rack is pretty faded and want to make a new one. Thanks! Todd Paisley From rtellason at verizon.net Tue Mar 9 19:06:36 2010 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason, Sr.) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 20:06:36 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <201003092006.38092.rtellason@verizon.net> On Saturday 20 February 2010 02:33:27 pm Tony Duell wrote: > > Cooking takes time ... few people have that now days! > > Given that we now have all these devices that are supposed to save time, > how come we hve less time than we used to? > > -tony People's priorities are all screwed up... (Just getting more into cooking lately than I used to be.) -- 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 wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 19:11:37 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 20:11:37 -0500 Subject: PDP-11 Color Codes In-Reply-To: References: <711EFBD9028842B2A83E959A77A3B631@andrewdesktop> Message-ID: > Does anyone know the CYMK or RGB color codes for the PDP-11 rack header? > This is the maroon/purple color scheme. ?The one on my rack is pretty faded > and want to make a new one. ?Thanks! DEC header panels, or whatever they are called, have a very complex coding scheme, dictated by: Marketing Dept. requests Whatever DEC could get cheap Available clean silkscreens Mistakes and coverups Department secretary's mood Number of tokes administered -- Will From healyzh at aracnet.com Tue Mar 9 19:21:18 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 17:21:18 -0800 Subject: PDP-11 Color Codes In-Reply-To: References: <711EFBD9028842B2A83E959A77A3B631@andrewdesktop> Message-ID: At 8:11 PM -0500 3/9/10, William Donzelli wrote: > > Does anyone know the CYMK or RGB color codes for the PDP-11 rack header? >> This is the maroon/purple color scheme. The one on my rack is pretty faded >> and want to make a new one. Thanks! > >DEC header panels, or whatever they are called, have a very complex >coding scheme, dictated by: > >Marketing Dept. requests >Whatever DEC could get cheap >Available clean silkscreens >Mistakes and coverups >Department secretary's mood >Number of tokes administered This has to be the best explanation I've ever seen of this subject! Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 Tue Mar 9 19:29:35 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 18:29:35 -0700 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <201003092006.38092.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <201003092006.38092.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B96F5FF.8090104@jetnet.ab.ca> Roy J. Tellason, Sr. wrote: > On Saturday 20 February 2010 02:33:27 pm Tony Duell wrote: >>> Cooking takes time ... few people have that now days! >> >> Given that we now have all these devices that are supposed to save time, >> how come we hve less time than we used to? >> >> -tony > > People's priorities are all screwed up... > > (Just getting more into cooking lately than I used to be.) I find eating to be a more important priority than say sex. The real question is: "Cola important for Programming?" Ben. The real topic here? Why now did this post show up on the list. This is March. From rtellason at verizon.net Tue Mar 9 19:42:23 2010 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason, Sr.) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 20:42:23 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B96F5FF.8090104@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <201003092006.38092.rtellason@verizon.net> <4B96F5FF.8090104@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <201003092042.25408.rtellason@verizon.net> On Tuesday 09 March 2010 08:29:35 pm Ben wrote: > Roy J. Tellason, Sr. wrote: > > On Saturday 20 February 2010 02:33:27 pm Tony Duell wrote: > >>> Cooking takes time ... few people have that now days! > >> > >> Given that we now have all these devices that are supposed to save time, > >> how come we hve less time than we used to? > >> > >> -tony > > > > People's priorities are all screwed up... > > > > (Just getting more into cooking lately than I used to be.) > > I find eating to be a more important priority than say sex. > The real question is: "Cola important for Programming?" > Ben. > The real topic here? Why now did this post show up on the list. > This is March. Because I'm a little behind in my reading? Something over 800 posts when I started, down to 200-some-odd at this point. -- 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 ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 19:52:07 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 20:52:07 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B96F5FF.8090104@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <201003092006.38092.rtellason@verizon.net> <4B96F5FF.8090104@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 8:29 PM, Ben wrote: > I find eating to be a more important priority than say sex. > The real question is: "Cola important for Programming?" > Ben. Cola is *essential* for Programming. Good cola, not store-brand. -ethan From rtellason at verizon.net Tue Mar 9 20:20:55 2010 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason, Sr.) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:20:55 -0500 Subject: Tubes (was OT: Televisions) In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381002161353n2ea6e4d9i622aa9fd118011ee@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <201003092120.58487.rtellason@verizon.net> On Tuesday 16 February 2010 08:37:43 pm William Donzelli wrote: > >Emic still rules the high power RF world, as there is not a semiconductor > > substitution for a TV / Radio transmitter final output yet. > > No - modern high power transmitters use redundant hot-swappable > amplifier modules in quantity. A few manuafacturers may still make > tube based designs, but they are getting long in the tooth. > > Hell, even Eimac is pretty much gone. > > -- > Will The last time I saw some of those big jugs was last October, while visiting a friend (somewhat older than I am, in his late sixties or early seventies), and who knew them well. He had an assortment of them around, and was talking to me about a bunch of them being destined for some sort of a display exhibit... -- 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 jhfinedp3k at compsys.to Tue Mar 9 20:21:36 2010 From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:21:36 -0500 Subject: XXDP program to test a DLV11-J Message-ID: <4B970230.4040602@compsys.to> Does anyone know if an XXDP program exists to test a DLV11-J? Any do you also know the name of the program? Thank you in advance if you can help. Jerome Fine From segin2005 at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 20:25:33 2010 From: segin2005 at gmail.com (Kirn Gill) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 21:25:33 -0500 Subject: Old books, mostly UNIX books In-Reply-To: References: <5a4d65ae1003091453i6d9ef9b9sf78d8eb25c62a98f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <5a4d65ae1003091825v76e3e8fepd3ac363bf8582b87@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 19:21, Dave McGuire wrote: > > I'll rescue any leftovers. (and can pick them up) > > Are you moving or something? > > -Dave > > On Mar 9, 2010, at 5:53 PM, Kirn Gill wrote: > > I've got a number of old UNIX books that I need to get rid of soon. > > > > Books I have: > > > > The Waite Group's UNIX? Primer Plus (Sams Publishing) ISBN > > 0-672-22729-0 > > Introduction To UNIX? (QUE Publishing) > ISBN > > 0-88022-745-1 > > QuickBASIC Programmer's Toolkit (QUE Publishing) ISBN > > 0-88022-450-9 > > UNIX? Programmer's Reference (QUE Publishing) ISBN > > 0-88022-536-X > > UNIX? Networking (Hayden Books) > ISBN > > 0-672-48440-4 > > Exploring the UNIX? System, Second Edition (Hayden Books) ISBN > > 0-672-48447-1 > > EXAM CRAM TCP/IP for MCSE (Certification Insider Press) > > ISBN 1-57610-476-1 > > > > All ISBN codes reported exactly as they appear on the physical books > > themselves. Abnormal or non-compliant hyphenation is therefore the fault > of > > the publisher. > > > > "QuickBASIC Programmer's Toolkit" includes a 5.25" floppy disk. The disk > is > > in near-perfect condition (visually), with the only noticeable issue is > that > > the disk label has lost it's adhesiveness. Unknown whether it is 360K or > > 1.2M. Whoever takes this book, I request that you image this disk for me. > > Something mountable using a loopback device, please, no DOS Teledisk > format > > or whatever. > > > > Please reply either on or off list. Shipping location is Gibsonton, > Florida, > > United States of America. Zip/Postal is 33534. > > > > I have to get rid of these by Saturday. I don't want to have to garbage > them > > if someone will take them. > > -- > Dave McGuire > Port Charlotte, FL > > Not moving or anything, I just need to clean house. I don't particularly like the idea or anything but, ehh, shit happens. From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Tue Mar 9 20:45:29 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 20:45:29 -0600 Subject: Tubes (was OT: Televisions) In-Reply-To: <201003092120.58487.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <6dbe3c381002161353n2ea6e4d9i622aa9fd118011ee@mail.gmail.com>, , , <201003092120.58487.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: This Thursday Barrie Gilbert is giving a talk at my local ham club TERAC, and promises to bring some rare and exotic tubes. Im looking forward to it, and I will report the rare stuff he brings to the talk. We are all encouraged to bring our favorite tubes, I'm sure there will be some Emiac tubes there. Im bringing a 3BP1, a 3" CRT. I got a pair of these new, in the original sealed government boxes from 1945. When I opened them, I swear the air inside was from 1945, I felt like Indiana Jones opening a tomb. (My project is a scope clock) Randy > From: rtellason at verizon.net > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: Tubes (was OT: Televisions) > Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 21:20:55 -0500 > > On Tuesday 16 February 2010 08:37:43 pm William Donzelli wrote: > > >Emic still rules the high power RF world, as there is not a semiconductor > > > substitution for a TV / Radio transmitter final output yet. > > > > No - modern high power transmitters use redundant hot-swappable > > amplifier modules in quantity. A few manuafacturers may still make > > tube based designs, but they are getting long in the tooth. > > > > Hell, even Eimac is pretty much gone. > > > > -- > > Will > > The last time I saw some of those big jugs was last October, while visiting a > friend (somewhat older than I am, in his late sixties or early seventies), > and who knew them well. He had an assortment of them around, and was > talking to me about a bunch of them being destined for some sort of a display > exhibit... > > > -- > 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 _________________________________________________________________ Your E-mail and More On-the-Go. Get Windows Live Hotmail Free. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/201469229/direct/01/ From evan at snarc.net Tue Mar 9 20:51:03 2010 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:51:03 -0500 Subject: History of .... Message-ID: <4B970917.4050205@snarc.net> Dare I say it, here's a good piece on the history of (gasp!) Windows: http://technologizer.com/2010/03/08/the-secret-origin-of-windows/ Don't kill the messenger. :) From wmaddox at pacbell.net Tue Mar 9 20:52:37 2010 From: wmaddox at pacbell.net (William Maddox) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 18:52:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: PDP-11 Color Codes In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <195428.10225.qm@web82602.mail.mud.yahoo.com> RGB "codes" don't really say anything about the actual color, which depends on the device and its calibration. It is a very complex matter indeed to get a reasonably consistent rendering of colors between various printers and displays for the same image data. In the world of manufacturing and graphic arts, the Pantone system seems to be the most widely used. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantone But no, I don't know the Pantone numbers for the DEC panels, and based on Will's comments, I doubt there ever was an official one. I did see some discussion of cabinet colors at one point that indicated that the official standard was a particular paint manufacturer's part number. --Bill From IanK at vulcan.com Tue Mar 9 21:22:07 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 19:22:07 -0800 Subject: PDP-11 Color Codes In-Reply-To: References: <711EFBD9028842B2A83E959A77A3B631@andrewdesktop> , Message-ID: Maybe that explains the numbering scheme, too. ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Zane H. Healy [healyzh at aracnet.com] Sent: Tuesday, March 09, 2010 5:21 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: PDP-11 Color Codes At 8:11 PM -0500 3/9/10, William Donzelli wrote: > > Does anyone know the CYMK or RGB color codes for the PDP-11 rack header? >> This is the maroon/purple color scheme. The one on my rack is pretty faded >> and want to make a new one. Thanks! > >DEC header panels, or whatever they are called, have a very complex >coding scheme, dictated by: > >Marketing Dept. requests >Whatever DEC could get cheap >Available clean silkscreens >Mistakes and coverups >Department secretary's mood >Number of tokes administered This has to be the best explanation I've ever seen of this subject! Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 lynchaj at yahoo.com Tue Mar 9 21:27:24 2010 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 22:27:24 -0500 Subject: Adding VGA, PS/2 keyboard, and microSD to generic Z80 CPU classic computers Message-ID: <038C630A3D4644349F2AA7CE2DFC9487@andrewdesktop> > platforms. > > The idea is impressive, but that PCB is huge. Any chance the design could be made smaller? Jim Hi Jim The PropIO was designed as an ECB standard board (160x100mm) Eurocard format and is intended for use with the rest of the N8VEM system. However, the subject came up of adding SD to KayPro on the vintage-computer.com forums and rather than designing a board unique to that system my hope is to reuse an existing part with little or no modification. If you were to design a specific Propeller board for the KayPro it could be much smaller but then it would be forever tied to that platform. The concept here is to make an adapter board to allow general purpose N8VEM boards to provide IO to the less common vintage computers that are "stranded" due to lack of current hardware development and/or small developer community. WaveMate Bullet is an example but I am sure there are dozens if not hundreds of others. I am trying to gauge what sort of interest there is in this approach if any. Certainly this is less than optimal solution for any specific machine but then it may be applicable across a whole spectrum of vintage computers (Z80 DIP 40 socket). Most likely this idea will go no where but it is interesting to me and the initial test results are showing promise. This in theory could be a way to add features like DiskIO (IDE/FDC), video (VDU), or microSD (PropIO) to less common systems that otherwise would never get it. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch PS, the empty sockets on the PropIO are for the second Propeller. It is currently unallocated but communicates with the SBC over the ECB in a similar fashion as the first Propeller which serves the PS/2 keyboard, VGA, and microSD interface. The second Propeller has several free IO pins which are intended for builder experimentation. There are a few proposed ideas on how to use the second Propeller such as an EN28J60 Ethernet interface with PropNIC and/or the Propeller USB converter. I was planning initially on adding TV, audio, and some other toy doodads but the other builders convinced me to keep the second Propeller unallocated and instead add the mini prototyping area. The PropIO also includes a mezzanine connector and mounting hardware for a full sized mezzanine "upper deck" so builders can add whatever suits them. PropIO is a rather experimental board and not really a final design - more of a proof of concept. Thus it is ideal for situations where non-typical adaptations like jamming into a KayPro are being explored. From lynchaj at yahoo.com Tue Mar 9 21:50:24 2010 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 22:50:24 -0500 Subject: Adding VGA, PS/2 keyboard, and microSD to generic Z80 CPU classic computers Message-ID: <59C0B6858FBC44E0964A3149C2A59FC9@andrewdesktop> > platforms. > > The idea is impressive, but that PCB is huge. Any chance the design could be made smaller? Jim Hi Jim I was thinking more about your question. The system in the photos is using a standard PropIO board with a *prototype* CPU adapter "shim socket" which would *not* be part of the final design. If the tests prove out then the perfboard and ribbon cable would be replaced with a 2"x1.5" shim socket PCB that would plug in under the host Z80 CPU. It would export the Z80 pins out to 40 pin dual row header. The PropIO would connect to the shim socket PCB via a 40 conductor ribbon cable. So yes, in that sense the system would be smaller than what is pictured in the N8VEM post. It would be functionally identical. I hope that clarifies things. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Mar 9 22:26:47 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:26:47 -0700 Subject: Tubes (was OT: Televisions) In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381002161353n2ea6e4d9i622aa9fd118011ee@mail.gmail.com>, , , <201003092120.58487.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B971F87.8000500@jetnet.ab.ca> Randy Dawson wrote: > > This Thursday Barrie Gilbert is giving a talk at my local ham club > TERAC, and promises to bring some rare and exotic tubes. Im looking > forward to it, and I will report the rare stuff he brings to the > talk. We are all encouraged to bring our favorite tubes, I'm sure > there will be some Emiac tubes there. Im bringing a 3BP1, a 3" CRT. > I got a pair of these new, in the original sealed government boxes > from 1945. When I opened them, I swear the air inside was from 1945, > I felt like Indiana Jones opening a tomb. I picked up a few loctal tubes, and one had the orginal box and price. I think it was $3.50 or $7.50, a small fortune in the late 1930's. > (My project is a scope clock) > > Randy Ben. PS. My favorite tube is the humble 45. From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 22:43:54 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 23:43:54 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: References: <201003092006.38092.rtellason@verizon.net> <4B96F5FF.8090104@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4B97238A.3050108@gmail.com> Ethan Dicks wrote: > On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 8:29 PM, Ben wrote: >> I find eating to be a more important priority than say sex. >> The real question is: "Cola important for Programming?" >> Ben. > > Cola is *essential* for Programming. > > Good cola, not store-brand. Ian Primus taught me that "rotary debugger" is a synonym for "pizza", incidentally. Peace... Sridhar From glen.slick at gmail.com Tue Mar 9 23:19:42 2010 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 21:19:42 -0800 Subject: XXDP program to test a DLV11-J In-Reply-To: <4B970230.4040602@compsys.to> References: <4B970230.4040602@compsys.to> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e91003092119p24987f24sdcd1a56da23dd438@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 6:21 PM, Jerome H. Fine wrote: > Does anyone know if an XXDP program exists to test a DLV11-J? ?Any > do you also know the name of the program? > > Thank you in advance if you can help. > > Jerome Fine > VDLAB0 - DLV11-J LOGIC TEST http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/pdp11/xxdp/PDP11_DiagnosticHandbook_1988.pdf Page 2-5 From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 9 23:35:11 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:35:11 -0800 Subject: Tubes (was OT: Televisions) In-Reply-To: <201003092120.58487.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <6dbe3c381002161353n2ea6e4d9i622aa9fd118011ee@mail.gmail.com>, , <201003092120.58487.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B96BF0F.13334.2B54134@cclist.sydex.com> On 9 Mar 2010 at 21:20, Roy J. Tellason, Sr. wrote: > On Tuesday 16 February 2010 08:37:43 pm William Donzelli wrote: > > No - modern high power transmitters use redundant hot-swappable > > amplifier modules in quantity. A few manuafacturers may still make > > tube based designs, but they are getting long in the tooth. > > > > Hell, even Eimac is pretty much gone. > > The last time I saw some of those big jugs was last October, while > visiting a friend (somewhat older than I am, in his late sixties or > early seventies), and who knew them well. He had an assortment of > them around, and was talking to me about a bunch of them being > destined for some sort of a display exhibit... When I see the Eimac brand, I still think of Jo Jennings. (and *not* the Olympic high jumper by the same name). --Chuck From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 11:06:52 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 12:06:52 -0500 Subject: Old books, mostly UNIX books In-Reply-To: <5a4d65ae1003091825v76e3e8fepd3ac363bf8582b87@mail.gmail.com> References: <5a4d65ae1003091453i6d9ef9b9sf78d8eb25c62a98f@mail.gmail.com> <5a4d65ae1003091825v76e3e8fepd3ac363bf8582b87@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Sounds good. Let me know if there are any leftovers after your deadline and my lady and I will run up and grab 'em. I'd offer to bring you a carload of gear (lotsa surplus stuff right now), but if you're cleaning house.. -Dave On Mar 9, 2010, at 9:25 PM, Kirn Gill wrote: >> I'll rescue any leftovers. (and can pick them up) >> >> Are you moving or something? >> >> -Dave >> >> On Mar 9, 2010, at 5:53 PM, Kirn Gill wrote: >>> I've got a number of old UNIX books that I need to get rid of soon. >>> >>> Books I have: >>> >>> The Waite Group's UNIX? Primer Plus (Sams Publishing) ISBN >>> 0-672-22729-0 >>> Introduction To UNIX? (QUE Publishing) >> ISBN >>> 0-88022-745-1 >>> QuickBASIC Programmer's Toolkit (QUE Publishing) ISBN >>> 0-88022-450-9 >>> UNIX? Programmer's Reference (QUE Publishing) >>> ISBN >>> 0-88022-536-X >>> UNIX? Networking (Hayden Books) >> ISBN >>> 0-672-48440-4 >>> Exploring the UNIX? System, Second Edition (Hayden Books) ISBN >>> 0-672-48447-1 >>> EXAM CRAM TCP/IP for MCSE (Certification >>> Insider Press) >>> ISBN 1-57610-476-1 >>> >>> All ISBN codes reported exactly as they appear on the physical books >>> themselves. Abnormal or non-compliant hyphenation is therefore >>> the fault >> of >>> the publisher. >>> >>> "QuickBASIC Programmer's Toolkit" includes a 5.25" floppy disk. >>> The disk >> is >>> in near-perfect condition (visually), with the only noticeable >>> issue is >> that >>> the disk label has lost it's adhesiveness. Unknown whether it is >>> 360K or >>> 1.2M. Whoever takes this book, I request that you image this disk >>> for me. >>> Something mountable using a loopback device, please, no DOS Teledisk >> format >>> or whatever. >>> >>> Please reply either on or off list. Shipping location is Gibsonton, >> Florida, >>> United States of America. Zip/Postal is 33534. >>> >>> I have to get rid of these by Saturday. I don't want to have to >>> garbage >> them >>> if someone will take them. >> >> -- >> Dave McGuire >> Port Charlotte, FL >> >> Not moving or anything, I just need to clean house. I don't >> particularly > like the idea or anything but, ehh, shit happens. -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 10 11:25:54 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:25:54 -0800 Subject: Wirewrap boards update Message-ID: <4B9765A2.2017.4EDF39@cclist.sydex.com> Steve, it's hard to tell. Are all of these boards used? If not, I may be interested in one. Cutting wire out of one of these is a very tedious job! Anyone have any quick-and-dirty suggestions? Thanks, Chuck From dkelvey at hotmail.com Wed Mar 10 11:28:48 2010 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:28:48 -0800 Subject: Anyone running RTE-M on an HP 21MX series M, E, or F? In-Reply-To: References: , , <4B92A153.6000408@cimmeri.com>, , , , Message-ID: > From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de > > On Sun, 7 Mar 2010, dwight elvey wrote: > > I figure the HP-IB is the easiest option for mass storeage. I'll most > > likely need to write a driver but I can do that. > > What's wrong with DVM33 (supposed you have a 12821A disc interface card)? > > Christian Hi Christian I don't have a 12821, it is a 59310. It should work for most any HP-IB thought. I do have a 13175 board but without the external controller, it is not much use. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Free, trusted and rich email service. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/201469228/direct/01/ From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Wed Mar 10 11:32:48 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 11:32:48 -0600 Subject: Wirewrap boards update In-Reply-To: <4B9765A2.2017.4EDF39@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4B9765A2.2017.4EDF39@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: The OK hand wirewrap tool, on the opposite end is an unwrap bit. Its pretty quick, just a few twists on each post and its unwrapped. Still tedious. I dont know if there is an unwrap bit for an electric WW gun, or if they even go in reverse... How much are these going for, I would be interested in a few of them. Randy > From: cclist at sydex.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:25:54 -0800 > Subject: Re: Wirewrap boards update > > Steve, it's hard to tell. Are all of these boards used? If not, I > may be interested in one. Cutting wire out of one of these is a very > tedious job! Anyone have any quick-and-dirty suggestions? > > Thanks, > Chuck > _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Powerful Free email with security by Microsoft. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/201469230/direct/01/ From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 10 11:54:12 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:54:12 -0800 Subject: Wirewrap boards update In-Reply-To: References: <4B9765A2.2017.4EDF39@cclist.sydex.com>, Message-ID: <4B976C44.14871.68C77C@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Mar 2010 at 11:32, Randy Dawson wrote: > > The OK hand wirewrap tool, on the opposite end is an unwrap bit. Its > pretty quick, just a few twists on each post and its unwrapped. Still > tedious. I dont know if there is an unwrap bit for an electric WW > gun, or if they even go in reverse... I've chucked an unwap bit in an electric screwdriver, but it takes a *lot* of time to undo one of these and you'll go blind doing it, peering through a forest of pins on 0.100" centers. I was thinking about a tool that would simply slide over the 0.025" square post and cut the wraps off. Maybe I'm dreaming. --Chuck From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 10 12:49:42 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:49:42 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B96DF65.7090308@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 9, 10 11:53:09 pm Message-ID: > > I find (stripped) wire-wrap wire to be useful for this sort of thing. > > It's thin, and soldered easily. > > I think I've got some of that (though I'll be buggered if I can remember > where it is). 40AWG with either blue or green insulation, IIRC. Really > thin stuff. It's normally 30AWG, I think. I find it's useful for making links on stripboard too, it's thin enough to run round the IC sockets neatly, you can put 2 wires in one hole (or a wire and an IC socket pin in one hole) if you're short of space, and it solders well. Of course I als use it for wire-wrapping, modifying DEC backplanes [1] and the like. []1] I always make the NPG jumper using a distinctive colour of wire (often red), so I can find it easily if I want to remove it. It's a pity Maplin no longer sell it. It was useful just being able to pop into the shop and buy a couple of reels. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 10 12:53:50 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:53:50 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B96E4E4.1CC6EE7D@cs.ubc.ca> from "Brent Hilpert" at Mar 9, 10 04:16:36 pm Message-ID: > > #40 is really, really thin (<0.08 mm, ~0.003in), only likely to be used for > winding coils. And darn hard to find in sensible quantities... > > I was rewinding a coil with #38 a couple weeks ago, not much latitude for > indelicate slip-ups. > I rewound a couple of motors useing 38swg wire (5 thou, 0.15mm or thereabouts) a month or two ago. It was a lot easier than I expected, even though I got the connections to the commutator wrong the first time and had to wind that armature again. Actually, this was on-topic. The motors were from an HP9125A plotter, which is used with the HP9100 calculator. The HP9125 is all discrete transsitors (mostly bipolar, but a few JFETs), there are almost 100 transistors on each DAC board. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 10 13:03:57 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:03:57 +0000 (GMT) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: <4B96EB42.20302@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 10, 10 00:43:46 am Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > >> There are certain exceptions... if I needed some mechanical component > >> machining I'd probably look for a local machine shop and ask them (my > > > > You are lucky to have a 'local machine shop'/ There are, AFAIK, no such > > places round here. > > There's an engineering company in Huddersfield (Pennine Radio) that does There was a mention of a Pennine Radio set in The Radiophile magazine a few months back. I assume it's somewhat related :-). > sheet-metal and machining work. I'm toying with the idea of asking them > for a quote on doing the CNC work on the DiscFerret front/rear panels. > > If I had a CNC rig I'd do it myself, but the idea of drilling out the > front panels for even a small production run does not appeal to me... Err, you could always get the purchaser/constructor to drill his own panel. A large number of kits that I've assembled over the years required you to do that. I much prefer thigns to come as kits (toally unsoldered), since then I can use solder and techniques that have been used for many years and which I trust, unlike htis lead-free stuff which is certainly not reliabel if soldered at too low a temperature (which it often seems to be on commertical boards...) > > > [Silly example/ I was cleaning up an old Epson printer nad dropped a > > plastic bush from the paper feed mechansim. I looked for it for over an > > hour and couldn't find it (I've still not found it). In the end I grabbed > > a bit of brass rod and turned a suitable replacemnt in a few minutes...] > > Knowing Epson kit, that "non-factory replacement part" (GRIN) will > probably outlast the rest of the printer. THis weas an old-ish Epson (An FX-80 or MX-80 or something). It's actually quite well made. It'll probably end up with an HPIB interface board in it (which I do have) although I don't have the replacement firmware ROMs to turn it into an HP82906. > > The last two Epsons I had (a C84 and a C86) both died from Blocked > Print-head Syndrome. The ink dries in the head, then when the piezo > actuators are triggered on power up for the "cleaning" cycle, they > break/blow. Ugh. This is a good old-fashioned 9-pin impact matrix printer. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 10 13:05:49 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:05:49 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: from "Ethan Dicks" at Mar 9, 10 08:52:07 pm Message-ID: > Cola is *essential* for Programming. Ah, that explains why I'm not a programmer. I can't stand the stuff.... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 10 13:11:14 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:11:14 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Tubes (was OT: Televisions) In-Reply-To: <4B96BF0F.13334.2B54134@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 9, 10 09:35:11 pm Message-ID: > When I see the Eimac brand, I still think of Jo Jennings. (and *not* > the Olympic high jumper by the same name). Although presumably if you connect yourself between anode and cathode of such a high power valve you are liable to break the high jump record by wuite a large margin :-) -tony From jws at jwsss.com Wed Mar 10 12:22:47 2010 From: jws at jwsss.com (jim s) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 10:22:47 -0800 Subject: Wirewrap boards update In-Reply-To: <4B976C44.14871.68C77C@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4B9765A2.2017.4EDF39@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B976C44.14871.68C77C@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B97E377.10307@jwsss.com> I've seen wirewrap guns twist off pins. Your idea of a slow turning one with an unwrap pin in a screwdriver at maybe 30 to 60 rpm max is way better. Recall that the assemblers may have tweaked or weakened the pins, so a major twist with a high torque or speed power tool will probably take off pins as well as wire. Also the wire will be attached to other pins and as you cut off the wire at one end you will be pulling and perhaps setting up problems at the other end of the wire, unless you have something other than the unwrap bit. On 3/10/2010 9:54 AM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 10 Mar 2010 at 11:32, Randy Dawson wrote: > > >> The OK hand wirewrap tool, on the opposite end is an unwrap bit. Its >> pretty quick, just a few twists on each post and its unwrapped. Still >> tedious. I dont know if there is an unwrap bit for an electric WW >> gun, or if they even go in reverse... >> > I've chucked an unwap bit in an electric screwdriver, but it takes a > *lot* of time to undo one of these and you'll go blind doing it, > peering through a forest of pins on 0.100" centers. > > I was thinking about a tool that would simply slide over the 0.025" > square post and cut the wraps off. Maybe I'm dreaming. > > --Chuck > > > From glen.slick at gmail.com Wed Mar 10 13:29:48 2010 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 11:29:48 -0800 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools Message-ID: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com> So speaking of AWG 30, what is the best tool for stripping it for wirewrap purposes? Is something like an OK ST-500 a decent tool for around $33? http://media.digikey.com/photos/OK%20Industries%20-%20Jonard%20Photos/ST-500.jpg From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 10 13:29:28 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:29:28 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HPCC schematics CD-ROM version 4.0 Message-ID: There is now a new version of the HPCC schemaitcs CD-ROM. This one contains schematics for around 140 classic computer devices, I'll put a full list at the end of this message. As with the older disks, the schemaitcs are hand-drawn (by me). You will ahce to put up with my writing :-). There;s very little apart from the schematics, there are no isntruction o ntaking the things apart, no theory-of-operation information, and so on. In some cases the HP service manual is avaialble on-line, and will contain some of that information. All profits go to HPCC (Handheld and Portable Computer Cluh). To order the disk (I believe it's now 2 CD-ROMs or 1 DVD-ROM), please contact Dave Colver, sectretary at hpcc.org, who can tell you the price, etc And now for the machines chargers/eramco_pp Portable Plus car charger (Eramco) chargers/hp82028 chargers/hp82054 Car charger chargers/hp82055 Woodstock car charger desktops/hp110 `Portable' desktops/hp120 CP/M machine desktops/hp120key Notes on making a keyboard for the HP120 desktops/hp50960 SRM server desktops/hp86b desktop computer, external video monitor desktops/hp87 HP87 and HP87XM desktop computers desktops/hp9100b First generation RPN desktop desktops/hp9810 Second generation RPN desktop desktops/hp9815 RPN desktop calculator desktops/hp9816 68000-based computer with internal monitor desktops/hp9817 68010-based 'shoebox' desktops/hp9820 First Algebraic desktop desktops/hp9825 First HPL desktop (also covers 9831 BASIC desktop) desktops/hp982636 HP9826 and HP9836 68000 computers desktops/hp9830 First BASIC desktop desktops/hp9845b Desktop Computer, Opt 200 High speed language processor desktops/hp9915 Industrial control computer (based on HP85) desktops/integral Portable unix machine handhelds/classic/hp35 First handheld scientific handhelds/classic/hp45 Second handheld scientific handhelds/classic/hp55 Scientific with timer handhelds/classic/hp65 First handheld programmable handhelds/classic/hp67 Handheld programmable handhelds/classic/hp70 Simple financial handheld handhelds/classic/hp80 Financial handheld handhelds/hp48sxKeyboard HP48SX keyboard matrix handhelds/printing_classic/hp46 Printing 45 handhelds/printing_classic/hp81 Printing 80 (with many more functions) handhelds/spice/hp32e Non-continuous memory Spice (other 3xE are similar) handhelds/spice/hp33c Continuous memory Spice (other 3xC are similar) handhelds/sting/hp10a Printing adding machine handhelds/sting/hp19c Programming printing calculator handhelds/topcat/hp91 Printing scientific calculator handhelds/topcat/hp92 Printing financial calculator handhelds/topcat/hp95c Never-released printing programmable calculator handhelds/topcat/hp97sio I/O module part of HP97S handhelds/voyager/hp16c Programmer's calculator handhelds/woodstock/hp21 Scientific calculator handhelds/woodstock/hp22 Financial calculator handhelds/woodstock/hp25 Programmable calculator handhelds/woodstock/hp25c Continuous memory programmable calculator handhelds/woodstock/hp27 Financial and scientific calculator handhelds/woodstock/hp29c Continuous memory programmable calculator peripherals/dio/hp50962 DIO SRM Coax interface peripherals/dio/hp98204a DIO TV-rate video interface peripherals/dio/hp98204b DIO Video board (including graphics) peripherals/dio/hp98256 DIO 256K RAM PCB peripherals/dio/hp98257 DIO 1M RAM PCB peripherals/dio/hp98259 DIO 128K Bubble memory PCB peripherals/dio/hp98261 DIO ROM PCB peripherals/dio/hp98604 ROM HPL PCB for HP9000/200 machines peripherals/dio/hp98620b DIO DMA controller peripherals/dio/hp98622 DIO GPIO board peripherals/dio/hp98624 DIO HPIB Interface peripherals/dio/hp98626 DIO RS232 Interface peripherals/dio/hp98628 DIO RS232 Interface (Z80 controlled) peripherals/dio/hphil DIO HP-HIL/HPIB interface peripherals/dio/kbd9920 HP9920 keyboard interface/HPIB PCB peripherals/dio/kgmram KGM 1M DIO RAM board peripherals/dio/wkbp4a 3rd party 256K DIO RAM board peripherals/hhp_eprom EPROM box for HP41 peripherals/hp11202 8 bit parallel interface for HP98x0 peripherals/hp11203 BCD interface for HP98x0 peripherals/hp11205 RS232 interface for HP98x0 peripherals/hp11206 Modem interface for HP9830 peripherals/hp11284 Datacomms interface for 9830 peripherals/hp11336 Printer interface (HP9871) for HP98x0 peripherals/hp13264 Data link interface peripherals/hp13267 First multipoint interface peripherals/hp2671g HPIB Thermal printer peripherals/hp27201 HPIB extender peripherals/hp2748a Optical paper tape reader peripherals/hp35731 Monochrome monitor for HP9000/200 machines peripherals/hp46020 First type HP-HIL keyboard peripherals/hp46021 Second type HP-HIL keyboard peripherals/hp5055 Digital Recorder (strip printer) peripherals/hp59301 HPIB parallel interface peripherals/hp59304 HPIB remote display unit peripherals/hp59306 HPIB relay actuator peripherals/hp59308 HPIB timing generator peripherals/hp59309 HPIB digital clock peripherals/hp59401 HPIB analyser peripherals/hp59403 HPIB common carrier interface peripherals/hp59405 HPIB interface for HP9830 peripherals/hp59500 HPIB interface for HP6940 multiprogrammer peripherals/hp6940b Multiprogrammer peripherals/hp7245a Thermal printer/plotter peripherals/hp7440hpib HPIB ColourPro plotter peripherals/hp7470opt003 HPIL Plotter peripherals/hp7475 HPIB Plotter peripherals/hp7959b HPIB hard disk unit (ESDI drive) peripherals/hp82104 Card reader for HP41 peripherals/hp82143 Dedicated thermal printer for HP41 peripherals/hp82153 Barcode Wand for HP41 peripherals/hp82162 HPIL thermal printer peripherals/hp82168 HPIL modem peripherals/hp82440a IR thermal printer peripherals/hp82440b IR thermal printer peripherals/hp82901 Dual 5.25" disk drive peripherals/hp82905 Dot matrix printer (either HPIB or HPIL) peripherals/hp82985 Portable Plus video interface peripherals/hp9114a HPIL disk drivc peripherals/hp9114b HPIL disk drive peripherals/hp9121 Single-sided 3.5" HPIB floppy drive peripherals/hp9122 Double-sided 3.5" disk drive peripherals/hp9123 HPIB floppy drive for the HP150-II peripherals/hp9125a Plotter for HP9100 peripherals/hp9133h HPIB hard/floppy disk unit peripherals/hp9133vxv HP913V, HP9133XV hard/floppy disk units peripherals/hp9154b HPIB hard disk unit (Nighthawk drive) peripherals/hp98033 BCD interface for HP9825 peripherals/hp98034 HPIB interface for HP9825 peripherals/hp98035 Real time clock module for HP9825 peripherals/hp98036 RS232 interface for HP9825 peripherals/hp98133 BCD interface for HP9815 peripherals/hp98134 GPIO interface for HP9815 peripherals/hp9862if Plotter interface (only) for HP98x0 peripherals/hp9865 Cassette drive for HP98x0 -- Interface ONLY peripherals/hp9866 Thermal printer for 9800-series peripherals/hp9877 External tape drive for HP9825 peripherals/hp9878 Expansion chassis for HP9825 peripherals/hp98780 Enhanced mono monitor for HP9845B peripherals/ipc/hp82904 Expansion interface for Integral peripherals/ipc/hp82915 Modem PCB for Integral peripherals/ipc/hp82916 RAM PCBs for Integral peripherals/ipc/hp82919 RS232 interface for Integral peripherals/ipc/hp82971 ROM/EPROM module for Integral peripherals/mp/hp69321b 12-bit voltage D/A for multiprogrammer peripherals/mp/hp69330a Relay output for multiprogrammer peripherals/mp/hp69351 Voltage regulator for multiprogrammer peripherals/mp/hp69422a High-speed A/D for multiprogrammer peripherals/mp/hp69431a Digital input for multiprogrammer peripherals/mp/hp69502a Resistance program for multiprogrammer peripherals/paintjet Colour inkjet printer peripherals/rsu Eramco MLDL unit for HP41 peripherals/rsu2 Eramco MLDL for HP41 (card reader case) peripherals/wand75d Wand for the HP75D -tony From ian_primus at yahoo.com Wed Mar 10 13:36:46 2010 From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 11:36:46 -0800 (PST) Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <796043.36385.qm@web52603.mail.re2.yahoo.com> --- On Wed, 3/10/10, Glen Slick wrote: > > Is something like an OK ST-500 a decent tool for around > $33? > Every wire wrap too I've ever used has one built in. It's either a hole in the center of the tool with a blade, or a little removable tool that hides under the rotating cap of the tool. -Ian From jack.rubin at ameritech.net Wed Mar 10 14:03:51 2010 From: jack.rubin at ameritech.net (Jack Rubin) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 12:03:51 -0800 (PST) Subject: Another Cortesi book online - CP/M Programmer's Notebook Message-ID: <611736.77724.qm@web83711.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> Dave has added the CP/M Programmer's Notebook to his website? - http://www.tassos-oak.com Links to the Notebook and Dr.Dobbs Z80?Toolbook are at the bottom center of the page. If you aren't familiar?with his work, take a look. Highly recommended! Jack From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 10 14:18:56 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 12:18:56 -0800 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <796043.36385.qm@web52603.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com>, <796043.36385.qm@web52603.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4B978E30.20668.ED49F8@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Mar 2010 at 11:36, Mr Ian Primus wrote: > --- On Wed, 3/10/10, Glen Slick wrote: > > > > Is something like an OK ST-500 a decent tool for around > > $33? > > > > Every wire wrap too I've ever used has one built in. It's either a > hole in the center of the tool with a blade, or a little removable > tool that hides under the rotating cap of the tool. ...Like the $7 tool available from Radio Shack. Actually, a very decent tool. But for the best stripping, I use a Micro-Strip. It used to be made by Augut and retail for $20, but now is sold under the Tyco brand. They do show up on eBay at NOS discounts; I just picked on up item 280472770397--for $19.95. At DigiKey, you can expect to pay about $75. It's pretty much impossible to nick a wire with one of these, so they've found renewed interest as fiber optic strippers. --Chuck From tshoppa at wmata.com Wed Mar 10 14:39:12 2010 From: tshoppa at wmata.com (Shoppa, Tim) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:39:12 -0500 Subject: PDP-11 Color Codes Message-ID: I think the rack headers all faded fairly rapidly and especially on the plastic panels, some yellowing went on as well. I think the actual shade on any given sample could be used by industrial archaeologists to deduce the UV and ozone contents of previous decades :(. I personally don't like faded or yellowed colors so when I want to re-do a paint job, I always choose a hue and shade more vibrant than any of my existing samples. So go pick the most vibrant burgundy and maroon you can find at the paint shop. Tim. From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 10 15:06:46 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 13:06:46 -0800 (PST) Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > > Cola is *essential* for Programming. > Ah, that explains why I'm not a programmer. I can't stand the stuff.... The requirements can vary, depending on what language you use. From IanK at vulcan.com Wed Mar 10 15:16:38 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 13:16:38 -0800 Subject: Beverages and programming (was RE: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... )) In-Reply-To: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Fred Cisin > Sent: Wednesday, March 10, 2010 1:07 PM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) > > On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > > > Cola is *essential* for Programming. > > Ah, that explains why I'm not a programmer. I can't stand the > stuff.... > > The requirements can vary, depending on what language you use. > When I used to code in assembly, my beverage was coffee, morning, noon and night. And the community was there for me: http://www.faqs.org/rfcs/rfc2324.html ...although as I grew older and realized that sleep was not truly optional, I built out for other protocols as well: http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/intrepid/man1/uubp.1fun.html -- Ian From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 10 15:27:40 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:27:40 +0000 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <4B978E30.20668.ED49F8@cclist.sydex.com> References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com>, <796043.36385.qm@web52603.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <4B978E30.20668.ED49F8@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B980ECC.7000403@philpem.me.uk> Chuck Guzis wrote: > ...Like the $7 tool available from Radio Shack. Actually, a very > decent tool. I'll second that. I imported one when I built my COSMAC Elf -- bought it from a distributor who charged $5 to cut the "RadioShack" badge off the top... *groan* Well worth the money, though. Admittedly I don't bother with Wire Wrap any more, but the tool is still worth keeping around (same goes for most tools really -- I'm a compulsive tool-hoarder...) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 10 15:39:45 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 13:39:45 -0800 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <4B980ECC.7000403@philpem.me.uk> References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com>, <4B978E30.20668.ED49F8@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B980ECC.7000403@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4B97A121.23373.13747ED@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Mar 2010 at 21:27, Philip Pemberton wrote: > Well worth the money, though. Admittedly I don't bother with Wire Wrap > any more, but the tool is still worth keeping around (same goes for > most tools really -- I'm a compulsive tool-hoarder...) I love to wire-wrap. To me, it's the engineer's version of needlepoint, except that you wind up with something that (hopefully) does more than just sit there. --Chuck From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 10 15:42:44 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:42:44 +0000 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <20100220120310.G701@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100220120310.G701@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4B981254.6000204@philpem.me.uk> Fred Cisin wrote: > On Sat, 20 Feb 2010, Dave McGuire wrote: >> To be fair, we're doing a LOT more stuff. > > in order to be able to afford more devices to save time, . . . Why does this remind me of these lines from the theme to the film "Over the Hedge"? We drive our cars everyday To and from work both ways So we make just enough to pay To drive our cars to work each day .... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 15:44:25 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 16:44:25 -0500 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <4B97A121.23373.13747ED@cclist.sydex.com> References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com>, <4B978E30.20668.ED49F8@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B980ECC.7000403@philpem.me.uk> <4B97A121.23373.13747ED@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Mar 10, 2010, at 4:39 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> Well worth the money, though. Admittedly I don't bother with Wire >> Wrap >> any more, but the tool is still worth keeping around (same goes for >> most tools really -- I'm a compulsive tool-hoarder...) > > I love to wire-wrap. To me, it's the engineer's version of > needlepoint, except that you wind up with something that (hopefully) > does more than just sit there. Same here; been doing it forever, don't see myself stopping anytime soon. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 10 15:49:18 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:49:18 +0000 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B87C3AC.12693.C90751@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4B86D90F.21400.25C6CAA@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Feb 25, 10 08:09:51 pm, <4B87C3AC.12693.C90751@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B9813DE.3070302@philpem.me.uk> Chuck Guzis wrote: > Sometimes I'm just lucky. For each life you get a fixed number of lucky escapes. You never know how many you've been allocated, or even how many you have left. Only time you find out is when you screw up really badly and just happen to find out that the "lucky escapes remaining" counter was at zero... Cats, by comparison, have it easy. "Nine lives, minus falling off that second-floor balcony last week... and escaping that stupid pitbull the week before last..." :) Cheers, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com Wed Mar 10 15:49:17 2010 From: robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com (Rob Jarratt) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:49:17 -0000 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 Message-ID: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which ended up with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to build an FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD interface on the other which anyone could then program to emulate any disk/controller they like. I have been in touch with him to see how much interest he has had, because he needs a minimum number of about 10 to make it viable, but so far there has only been me and one other person showing an interest. David reckons they would come to a little over $200 each (possibly less if there is more interest). David is not yet on cctalk so he agreed to let me cross-post this to cctalk on his behalf, but I have cc'd him so you can reply direct. Regards Rob From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 10 16:03:04 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 14:03:04 -0800 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com>, <4B97A121.23373.13747ED@cclist.sydex.com>, Message-ID: <4B97A698.30876.14CA086@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Mar 2010 at 16:44, Dave McGuire wrote: > Same here; been doing it forever, don't see myself stopping > anytime soon. Heh, there's just something about the "whirr-click" of a wirewrap gun that stirs up memories. Sort of like the smell of ammonia has me remembering blueline machines. Human memory is a strange and wonderful thing. --Chuck From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Mar 10 16:13:28 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 14:13:28 -0800 (PST) Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, Rob Jarratt wrote: > There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which ended up > with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to build an > FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD interface on > the other which anyone could then program to emulate any disk/controller > they like. I have been in touch with him to see how much interest he has > had, because he needs a minimum number of about 10 to make it viable, but so > far there has only been me and one other person showing an interest. David > reckons they would come to a little over $200 each (possibly less if there > is more interest). David is not yet on cctalk so he agreed to let me > cross-post this to cctalk on his behalf, but I have cc'd him so you can > reply direct. > > Regards > > Rob > I think it would be useful to include the RD51 and RD52 in the list of supported drives. I believe it is MicroRSTS/E which expects something like an RD51 or RD52 for a system disk. Additionally would such a board support hardware partitioning? Something like the old Webster WQESD/04 EDSI boards where you can partition a drive into multiple drives that appear to be seperate physical drives to the OS? This is especially useful when running multiple OS's on the same hardware. This is something I would definitely be interested in, especially if the price is right. Another thought is, would it be possible to have it include a system clock on the same board? Zane From db at db.net Wed Mar 10 16:35:54 2010 From: db at db.net (Diane Bruce) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:35:54 -0500 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <4B97A698.30876.14CA086@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4B97A698.30876.14CA086@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20100310223554.GA77893@night.db.net> On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 02:03:04PM -0800, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 10 Mar 2010 at 16:44, Dave McGuire wrote: .. > Heh, there's just something about the "whirr-click" of a wirewrap gun > that stirs up memories. Sort of like the smell of ammonia has me I only ever owned one of those painful manual wrap tools. > remembering blueline machines. And gesteners. > > Human memory is a strange and wonderful thing. > > --Chuck - Diane -- - db at FreeBSD.org db at db.net http://www.db.net/~db From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 10 16:39:43 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:39:43 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 5:13 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > I think it would be useful to include the RD51 and RD52 in the list of > supported drives. ?I believe it is MicroRSTS/E which expects something like > an RD51 or RD52 for a system disk. And perhaps Venix and POS might not handle RD32s and RD53s? What about MicroVMS 1.0? For that matter, I think that might bring into question RQDX1 vs RQDX3 compatibility. It's been long enough that I'm a bit fuzzy on the differences from an OS driver standpoint (I remember well enough the differences in drive support and low-level formats). I would not consider lack of RD51 and RD52 support to be a deal-breaker, but if one is going to make a generic MSCP Q-bus SSD controller, one might as well permit 5MB and 10MB slices as well as 73MB and 154MB slices (since at the OS level, it eventually boils down (mostly) to disks of N-blocks-long). At $200, I'd consider one. At a lower price, I'd consider multiples. -ethan From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 16:45:01 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:45:01 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B981254.6000204@philpem.me.uk> References: <20100220120310.G701@shell.lmi.net> <4B981254.6000204@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <3D2F28A1-8884-42AC-B37E-CB9A288434E9@neurotica.com> On Mar 10, 2010, at 4:42 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote: >> On Sat, 20 Feb 2010, Dave McGuire wrote: >>> To be fair, we're doing a LOT more stuff. >> in order to be able to afford more devices to save time, . . . > > Why does this remind me of these lines from the theme to the film > "Over the Hedge"? > > We drive our cars everyday > To and from work both ways > So we make just enough to pay > To drive our cars to work each day > > .... Well, when you think about it, we're efficient little cash generators for the corporations. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From segin2005 at gmail.com Wed Mar 10 16:45:06 2010 From: segin2005 at gmail.com (Kirn Gill) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:45:06 -0500 Subject: Old books, mostly UNIX books In-Reply-To: References: <5a4d65ae1003091453i6d9ef9b9sf78d8eb25c62a98f@mail.gmail.com> <5a4d65ae1003091825v76e3e8fepd3ac363bf8582b87@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <5a4d65ae1003101445h67a7d76fo9cd7e52625eb870a@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 12:06, Dave McGuire wrote: > > Sounds good. Let me know if there are any leftovers after your deadline > and my lady and I will run up and grab 'em. > > I'd offer to bring you a carload of gear (lotsa surplus stuff right now), > but if you're cleaning house.. > > -Dave > -- > Dave McGuire > Port Charlotte, FL > > Someone just asked about getting them all, so I don't know if there is going to be anything left over As for surplus equipment, I'm mainly looking for modern PeeCee storage, mostly, and laptop form-factor (SO-DIMM) SDRAM cards for an iMac G3 (whose RAM connectors are on the processor card, necessitating the requirement for small form-factor RAM) I probably have a few more books that I have not listed, one of them being an X11 programmer's guide from circa 1993. Personally, I'd love to ship that overseas to a friend who is currently writing a window manager, but at least you are in a position that I can actually give it to you. From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 16:46:13 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:46:13 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> Message-ID: On Mar 10, 2010, at 4:49 PM, Rob Jarratt wrote: > There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which > ended up > with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to > build an > FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD > interface on > the other which anyone could then program to emulate any disk/ > controller > they like. I have been in touch with him to see how much interest > he has > had, because he needs a minimum number of about 10 to make it > viable, but so > far there has only been me and one other person showing an > interest. David > reckons they would come to a little over $200 each (possibly less > if there > is more interest). David is not yet on cctalk so he agreed to let me > cross-post this to cctalk on his behalf, but I have cc'd him so you > can > reply direct. [raises hand] -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From steve at cosam.org Wed Mar 10 16:47:03 2010 From: steve at cosam.org (Steve Maddison) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:47:03 +0100 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <-1733243550231976099@unknownmsgid> References: <-1733243550231976099@unknownmsgid> Message-ID: > There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which ended up > with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to build an > FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD interface on > the other which anyone could then program to emulate any disk/controller > they like. I should've known I'd miss something like this if I stopped following the newsgroups... I've been working on something similar, which would essentially be an SD and/or ATA-based MSCP adapter. The current design is based on an ARM microcontroller handling MSCP and physical storage and an as yet to be selected PLD of some description for the QBus interface and DMA. It's still in the early stages, but I have a fair bit of it worked out and have started on a prototype. I'm not a bit fan of duplicated effort, so depending on how far David's project is and the common goals, maybe there is room for collaboration or even combination of projects to some degree. > I have been in touch with him to see how much interest he has > had, because he needs a minimum number of about 10 to make it viable, but so > far there has only been me and one other person showing an interest. David > reckons they would come to a little over $200 each (possibly less if there > is more interest). If it does MSCP and all the stuff I want my own project to do (or can be easily programmed to do so) I'd want one - would save me a lot of work ;-) At $200 a pop though, I would be more interested in two or three unpopulated PCBs than a complete unit. Cheers, -- Steve Maddison http://www.cosam.org/ From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 16:47:57 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:47:57 -0500 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <4B97A698.30876.14CA086@cclist.sydex.com> References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com>, <4B97A121.23373.13747ED@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B97A698.30876.14CA086@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <6106670E-2202-4D0E-B031-7FAD98439A9D@neurotica.com> On Mar 10, 2010, at 5:03 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> Same here; been doing it forever, don't see myself stopping >> anytime soon. > > Heh, there's just something about the "whirr-click" of a wirewrap gun > that stirs up memories. Sort of like the smell of ammonia has me > remembering blueline machines. Yes. I rarely do it with a hand tool; I have two guns, a primary and a backup. Wrapping wire is no longer available at the corner store like it used to be, but you can still buy it online from a bunch of different places. > Human memory is a strange and wonderful thing. True, that. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 10 16:48:46 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:48:46 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 4:06 PM, Fred Cisin wrote: > On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: >> > Cola is *essential* for Programming. >> Ah, that explains why I'm not a programmer. I can't stand the stuff.... > > The requirements can vary, depending on what language you use. Coke (or Jolt!) is for Assembly and C and FORTRAN. Pepsi is for PASCAL (and other languages I don't like ;-) (Sugar vs Sugar-free is target-language agnostic.) I suppose one could come up with a suitable cola match for FORTH and other less-commonly-encountered languages. -ethan From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 16:52:09 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:52:09 -0500 Subject: Old books, mostly UNIX books In-Reply-To: <5a4d65ae1003101445h67a7d76fo9cd7e52625eb870a@mail.gmail.com> References: <5a4d65ae1003091453i6d9ef9b9sf78d8eb25c62a98f@mail.gmail.com> <5a4d65ae1003091825v76e3e8fepd3ac363bf8582b87@mail.gmail.com> <5a4d65ae1003101445h67a7d76fo9cd7e52625eb870a@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <198D4267-2588-4C8D-B1DC-5F87F4C82FB8@neurotica.com> On Mar 10, 2010, at 5:45 PM, Kirn Gill wrote: >> Sounds good. Let me know if there are any leftovers after your >> deadline >> and my lady and I will run up and grab 'em. >> >> I'd offer to bring you a carload of gear (lotsa surplus stuff >> right now), >> but if you're cleaning house.. > > Someone just asked about getting them all, so I don't know if there > is going > to be anything left over Sounds good. > As for surplus equipment, I'm mainly looking for modern PeeCee > storage, > mostly, and laptop form-factor (SO-DIMM) SDRAM cards for an iMac G3 > (whose > RAM connectors are on the processor card, necessitating the > requirement for > small form-factor RAM) Nope...no PeeCee stuff here. And modern stuff I'd be selling to my clients, not giving away. ;) *poke* I do have some RS/6000s that I'd like to re-home. (one of which is fairly beefy) > I probably have a few more books that I have not listed, one of > them being > an X11 programmer's guide from circa 1993. Personally, I'd love to > ship that > overseas to a friend who is currently writing a window manager, but > at least > you are in a position that I can actually give it to you. What's the exact title? I likely already have a copy. :-/ -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Mar 10 17:00:13 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:00:13 -0800 (PST) Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, Ethan Dicks wrote: > And perhaps Venix and POS might not handle RD32s and RD53s? What > about MicroVMS 1.0? For that matter, I think that might bring into > question RQDX1 vs RQDX3 compatibility. It's been long enough that I'm > a bit fuzzy on the differences from an OS driver standpoint (I > remember well enough the differences in drive support and low-level > formats). Good point, I hadn't thought about RQDX1 vs. RQDX3 issues. By POS you mean P/OS don't you? Which only runs on the DEC Pro's? Or am I missing/forgetting something here? > I would not consider lack of RD51 and RD52 support to be a > deal-breaker, but if one is going to make a generic MSCP Q-bus SSD > controller, one might as well permit 5MB and 10MB slices as well as > 73MB and 154MB slices (since at the OS level, it eventually boils down > (mostly) to disks of N-blocks-long). I wouldn't consider a lack of RD51 and RD52 support to be a deal-breaker either, simply a nice to have. My key concern is that I be able to put one of these in my /73 and boot RSTS/E, RSX-11M/M+, or RT-11 without any issues, and ideally without needing to swap CF cards. Currently my main two Q-Bus PDP-11's use removable SCSI Hard Drives than can be swapped between the two. In the case of RT-11, the same drive can be used on my PDP-11/44. > At $200, I'd consider one. At a lower price, I'd consider multiples. Truthfully if I could afford it, I probably would as well. I might be looking into getting rid of a majority of my Classic Hardware, but this touches on area's where I'm planning on staying semi-active. Zane From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 10 17:03:05 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:03:05 -0800 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: References: , <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net>, Message-ID: <4B97B4A9.14864.1839521@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Mar 2010 at 17:48, Ethan Dicks wrote: > Coke (or Jolt!) is for Assembly and C and FORTRAN. Pepsi is for > PASCAL (and other languages I don't like ;-) (Sugar vs Sugar-free is > target-language agnostic.) I suppose one could come up with a > suitable cola match for FORTH and other less-commonly-encountered > languages. When Fry's opened their first electronics store in the Bay area, they were the cheapest place to buy Jolt cola by the caselot. For a time, there was some bizarre chocolate-flavored diet soda (Canfields) that enjoyed a brief bit of popularity among the technoscenti. I suspected that BASIC programmers drank it. I thought it was revolting. --Chuck From bob at jfcl.com Wed Mar 10 17:08:13 2010 From: bob at jfcl.com (Bob Armstrong) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:08:13 -0800 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> Message-ID: <008301cac0a6$8fbd9170$af38b450$@com> >which anyone could then program to emulate any disk/controller they like. Ah, well, this is the hard part of the job, right? Building the board is the easy part. I'd buy a couple, at least, without exaggeration, if the Verilog or VHDL to make them functional already existed. Bob Armstrong From IanK at vulcan.com Wed Mar 10 17:09:38 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:09:38 -0800 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B97B4A9.14864.1839521@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net>, <4B97B4A9.14864.1839521@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Chuck Guzis > Sent: Wednesday, March 10, 2010 3:03 PM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) > > On 10 Mar 2010 at 17:48, Ethan Dicks wrote: > > > Coke (or Jolt!) is for Assembly and C and FORTRAN. Pepsi is for > > PASCAL (and other languages I don't like ;-) (Sugar vs Sugar-free is > > target-language agnostic.) I suppose one could come up with a > > suitable cola match for FORTH and other less-commonly-encountered > > languages. > > When Fry's opened their first electronics store in the Bay area, they > were the cheapest place to buy Jolt cola by the caselot. For a time, > there was some bizarre chocolate-flavored diet soda (Canfields) that > enjoyed a brief bit of popularity among the technoscenti. I > suspected that BASIC programmers drank it. I thought it was > revolting. > When I was at Microsoft, I noted that although we had free access to colas from both sides of the aisle (Pepsi and Coke), Jolt was not offered. My theory: they figured we'd drink ourselves to death by liver dysfunction. Mountain Dew was hazardous enough.... -- Ian From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Mar 10 17:25:06 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:25:06 -0800 (PST) Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <008301cac0a6$8fbd9170$af38b450$@com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <008301cac0a6$8fbd9170$af38b450$@com> Message-ID: On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, Bob Armstrong wrote: >> which anyone could then program to emulate any disk/controller they like. > > Ah, well, this is the hard part of the job, right? Building the board is > the easy part. > > I'd buy a couple, at least, without exaggeration, if the Verilog or VHDL > to make them functional already existed. > > Bob Armstrong Good point, I don't want to buy another "Catweasel". I bought a Zorro 2 Catweasel board for my Amiga years ago. They advertised all these disk formats it could read. They failed to mention that the drivers to read most of them didn't exist. Zane From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Mar 10 17:25:29 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:25:29 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sodas was Re: Soldering In-Reply-To: <4B97B4A9.14864.1839521@cclist.sydex.com> from Chuck Guzis at "Mar 10, 10 03:03:05 pm" Message-ID: <201003102325.o2ANPT0X005498@floodgap.com> > > Coke (or Jolt!) is for Assembly and C and FORTRAN. Pepsi is for > > PASCAL (and other languages I don't like ;-) (Sugar vs Sugar-free is > > target-language agnostic.) I suppose one could come up with a > > suitable cola match for FORTH and other less-commonly-encountered > > languages. > > When Fry's opened their first electronics store in the Bay area, they > were the cheapest place to buy Jolt cola by the caselot. For a time, > there was some bizarre chocolate-flavored diet soda (Canfields) that > enjoyed a brief bit of popularity among the technoscenti. I > suspected that BASIC programmers drank it. I thought it was > revolting. >From personal experience, Mr Pibb goes well with Perl, C and 6502 assembly language. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Haiku is easy/Sometimes it doesn't make sense/Refrigerator -- "KFI Haikus" - From alexeyt at freeshell.org Wed Mar 10 17:36:50 2010 From: alexeyt at freeshell.org (Alexey Toptygin) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:36:50 +0000 (UTC) Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, Ethan Dicks wrote: > Coke (or Jolt!) is for Assembly and C and FORTRAN. Pepsi is for > PASCAL (and other languages I don't like ;-) (Sugar vs Sugar-free is > target-language agnostic.) I suppose one could come up with a > suitable cola match for FORTH and other less-commonly-encountered > languages. I was always told that a Forth programmer drinks a fifth... Alexey From silent700 at gmail.com Wed Mar 10 17:53:11 2010 From: silent700 at gmail.com (Jason T) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:53:11 -0600 Subject: Sodas was Re: Soldering In-Reply-To: <201003102325.o2ANPT0X005498@floodgap.com> References: <4B97B4A9.14864.1839521@cclist.sydex.com> <201003102325.o2ANPT0X005498@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <51ea77731003101553s5b6f2cfanff8baede191c3841@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 5:25 PM, Cameron Kaiser wrote: >> there was some bizarre chocolate-flavored diet soda (Canfields) that >> enjoyed a brief bit of popularity among the technoscenti. ?I >> suspected that BASIC programmers drank it. ?I thought it was >> revolting. I remember when it was first (or I guess second, according to the article below) sold locally here in the Chicago area: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canfield%27s_Diet_Chocolate_Fudge And it was foul! Apparently, it is available again through your favorite online retailer. From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 10 18:01:40 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 16:01:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> > > The requirements can vary, depending on what language you use. On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, Ethan Dicks wrote: > Coke (or Jolt!) is for Assembly and C and FORTRAN. Pepsi is for > PASCAL (and other languages I don't like ;-) (Sugar vs Sugar-free is > target-language agnostic.) I suppose one could come up with a > suitable cola match for FORTH and other less-commonly-encountered > languages. FORTRAN was definitely a coffee language. I don't know whether ANYTHING goes with COBOL. For Tony, I think that we can agree that tea is an acceptable beverage for machine language and solder. From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 10 18:43:31 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 00:43:31 +0000 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <4B97A121.23373.13747ED@cclist.sydex.com> References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com>, <4B978E30.20668.ED49F8@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B980ECC.7000403@philpem.me.uk> <4B97A121.23373.13747ED@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B983CB3.3020709@philpem.me.uk> Chuck Guzis wrote: > I love to wire-wrap. To me, it's the engineer's version of > needlepoint, except that you wind up with something that (hopefully) > does more than just sit there. I've been using a Roadrunner pen since my supply of (cheap) wire-wrap sockets dried up. Similar idea, but with enamelled copper wire instead. You wrap the wire round a socket pin or component lead 2 or 3 times, then solder it, run it to the next lead, wrap, solder and carry on. It doesn't look pretty (though the wiring strips can help stop it turning into a complete rat's nest) but it works fine for anything up to about 20MHz or so. Best part is it works with standard components and sockets... I've even used it with SMD parts, though not to the standard that this guy has: http://elm-chan.org/ Some of his boards are so well done they're more like functional artwork... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From emu at e-bbes.com Wed Mar 10 18:50:11 2010 From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:50:11 -0700 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> Message-ID: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> Rob Jarratt wrote: > There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which ended up > with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to build an > FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD interface on Is there really still interest in it ? I put my design away few years ago, as I didn't see anybody interested enough to buy one. There is the seasonal talk of it for sure, but ... OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not that expensive. Remarks ? Cheers From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Mar 10 18:54:49 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 16:54:49 -0800 (PST) Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, e.stiebler wrote: > Rob Jarratt wrote: >> There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which ended up >> with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to build an >> FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD interface on > > Is there really still interest in it ? > > I put my design away few years ago, as I didn't see anybody interested enough > to buy one. > There is the seasonal talk of it for sure, but ... > > OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not that > expensive. > > Remarks ? What "old ones" show up on eBay? Zane From aek at bitsavers.org Wed Mar 10 18:58:11 2010 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 16:58:11 -0800 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com> References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B984023.5010307@bitsavers.org> On 3/10/10 11:29 AM, Glen Slick wrote: > So speaking of AWG 30, what is the best tool for stripping it for > wirewrap purposes? > A Clauss No-Nik http://www.twacomm.com/catalog/model_NN008.htm From emu at e-bbes.com Wed Mar 10 19:07:04 2010 From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:07:04 -0700 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: <4B984238.8030804@e-bbes.com> Zane H. Healy wrote: >> OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not that >> expensive. > > What "old ones" show up on eBay? The "usual" suspects like cmd, dilog, emulex ? OK, in all honesty I didn't check for more than a year, but they showed up before, that's why I canceled my design ... From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 10 19:19:10 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:19:10 -0800 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <4B983CB3.3020709@philpem.me.uk> References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com>, <4B97A121.23373.13747ED@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B983CB3.3020709@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4B97D48E.9694.2002B2C@cclist.sydex.com> On 11 Mar 2010 at 0:43, Philip Pemberton wrote: > I've been using a Roadrunner pen since my supply of (cheap) wire-wrap > sockets dried up. Similar idea, but with enamelled copper wire > instead. You wrap the wire round a socket pin or component lead 2 or 3 > times, then solder it, run it to the next lead, wrap, solder and carry > on. Didn't Vector have a system that used tefzel-insulated wire called "Slit-N-Wrap" that used a wiring pen with a little spool of wire on top? I've seen tefzel wire offered on eBay, but it always seems to be tinned, not silverplated. --Chuck From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Mar 10 19:23:18 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:23:18 -0800 (PST) Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <4B984238.8030804@e-bbes.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <4B984238.8030804@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, e.stiebler wrote: > Zane H. Healy wrote: > >>> OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not that >>> expensive. >> >> What "old ones" show up on eBay? > > The "usual" suspects like cmd, dilog, emulex ? > OK, in all honesty I didn't check for more than a year, but they showed up > before, that's why I canceled my design ... Okay, old 3rd party disk controllers. The problem with these is that they also require old hard drives. I'm also slightly surprised to hear mention of CMD controllers that aren't expensive, but then I've not looked for such things in years. My PDP-11's are using 1" High 3.5" SCSI Hard Drives, it does wonders for the noise level, and helps with the power consumption, but I'm honestly a bit worried about their long term viability. At least I have a much larger supply of SCSI drives I can use than I do MFM Hard Drives (and yes, I have a few of those, and a couple ESDI drives). Of course the other thing I worry about is power supplies. In fact that's what I've been loosing VMS boxes to. :-( Zane From curt at atarimuseum.com Wed Mar 10 19:27:18 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 20:27:18 -0500 Subject: Dire Straits Computer Graphics? In-Reply-To: <4B97D48E.9694.2002B2C@cclist.sydex.com> References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com>, <4B97A121.23373.13747ED@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B983CB3.3020709@philpem.me.uk> <4B97D48E.9694.2002B2C@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B9846F6.3050607@atarimuseum.com> Anyone know what computer was used to create the graphics for the Dire Straits MTV video "Money ain't for Nothing" ? Curt From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 10 19:34:20 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:34:20 -0800 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <20100310223554.GA77893@night.db.net> References: , <4B97A698.30876.14CA086@cclist.sydex.com>, <20100310223554.GA77893@night.db.net> Message-ID: <4B97D81C.19824.20E0B8A@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Mar 2010 at 17:35, Diane Bruce wrote: > I only ever owned one of those painful manual wrap tools. If you were using one of the little round Vector tools (really painful to use for long periods), a popular kludge was to fit the thing into the chuck of an battery-powered drafting eraser, such as a Koh-i-noor. Reverse the batteries to unwrap. It didn't index, but it was better than nothing. --Chuck From emu at e-bbes.com Wed Mar 10 19:42:40 2010 From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:42:40 -0700 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <4B984238.8030804@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: <4B984A90.1020106@e-bbes.com> Zane H. Healy wrote: > > My PDP-11's are using 1" High 3.5" SCSI Hard Drives, it does wonders for > the > noise level, and helps with the power consumption, but I'm honestly a bit > worried about their long term viability. At least I have a much larger > supply of SCSI drives I can use than I do MFM Hard Drives (and yes, I > have a few of those, and a couple ESDI drives). OK, I can tell you what I went through. First I used 2.5" IDE, but this made the board too big (was quad then) Next revision had a 1.8" drive on them, and I could make it on a double size board. Never thought of using SCSI, thought it is not worth it. Real IDE, never cared, simply because of the limited cable length. SATA ? To expensive, at least for the next few years. So, if I would touch it again, I would use SD-FLASH. Very easy to deal with, easy to exchange, cheap as hell. Cheers From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Mar 10 19:49:02 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:49:02 -0800 (PST) Subject: Dire Straits Computer Graphics? In-Reply-To: <4B9846F6.3050607@atarimuseum.com> from "Curt @ Atari Museum" at "Mar 10, 10 08:27:18 pm" Message-ID: <201003110149.o2B1n2Jt014554@floodgap.com> > Anyone know what computer was used to create the graphics for the Dire > Straits MTV video "Money ain't for Nothing" ? [You mean "Money For Nothing"] Yup! Wikipedia has a nice little article listing the computer as a Bosch FGS-4000. It was created by Ian Pearson and Gavin Blair, who went on to do Mainframe Entertainment (ReBoot, among others). The company is listed as "Limelight Films" in "State of the Art," with Blair in charge of graphics. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- rm -rf /bin/laden ---------------------------------------------------------- From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Mar 10 20:21:02 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:21:02 -0800 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <4B984A90.1020106@e-bbes.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <4B984238.8030804@e-bbes.com> <4B984A90.1020106@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: At 6:42 PM -0700 3/10/10, e.stiebler wrote: >So, if I would touch it again, I would use SD-FLASH. Very easy to >deal with, easy to exchange, cheap as hell. Honestly I think this is the only route to go if someone is developing a new interface at this point. The only reason my systems currently use SCSI is because I was in the right place at the right time. Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 emu at e-bbes.com Wed Mar 10 20:26:00 2010 From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:26:00 -0700 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <4B984238.8030804@e-bbes.com> <4B984A90.1020106@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: <4B9854B8.9020308@e-bbes.com> Zane H. Healy wrote: > At 6:42 PM -0700 3/10/10, e.stiebler wrote: >> So, if I would touch it again, I would use SD-FLASH. Very easy to deal >> with, easy to exchange, cheap as hell. > > Honestly I think this is the only route to go if someone is developing a > new interface at this point. The only reason my systems currently use > SCSI is because I was in the right place at the right time. exactly. fast enough (you get the 3 mbytes/s) and cheap. From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 20:50:58 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:50:58 -0500 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <4B97D48E.9694.2002B2C@cclist.sydex.com> References: <1e1fc3e91003101129n4b8e58e6o8d7b3ced660f8a65@mail.gmail.com>, <4B97A121.23373.13747ED@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B983CB3.3020709@philpem.me.uk> <4B97D48E.9694.2002B2C@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Mar 10, 2010, at 8:19 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> I've been using a Roadrunner pen since my supply of (cheap) wire-wrap >> sockets dried up. Similar idea, but with enamelled copper wire >> instead. You wrap the wire round a socket pin or component lead 2 >> or 3 >> times, then solder it, run it to the next lead, wrap, solder and >> carry >> on. > > Didn't Vector have a system that used tefzel-insulated wire called > "Slit-N-Wrap" that used a wiring pen with a little spool of wire on > top? I've seen tefzel wire offered on eBay, but it always seems to > be tinned, not silverplated. Yeah, I remember those ads. "Slit-N-Wrap...don't Just Wrap and wonder if the post cut the insulation". They were competing with the Just Wrap product, which is self-explanatory. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 20:52:30 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:52:30 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> On Mar 10, 2010, at 7:50 PM, e.stiebler wrote: >> There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which >> ended up >> with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to >> build an >> FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD >> interface on > > Is there really still interest in it ? > > I put my design away few years ago, as I didn't see anybody > interested enough to buy one. > There is the seasonal talk of it for sure, but ... > > OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not > that expensive. > > Remarks ? Not that expensive? I call $100-200 for a Qbus card pretty pricey. Unibus models go for many hundreds, upwards of $1000. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From curt at atarimuseum.com Wed Mar 10 20:52:23 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:52:23 -0500 Subject: Dire Straits Computer Graphics? In-Reply-To: <201003110149.o2B1n2Jt014554@floodgap.com> References: <201003110149.o2B1n2Jt014554@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <4B985AE7.50204@atarimuseum.com> Thanks Cameron! Cameron Kaiser wrote: >> Anyone know what computer was used to create the graphics for the Dire >> Straits MTV video "Money ain't for Nothing" ? >> > > [You mean "Money For Nothing"] > > Yup! Wikipedia has a nice little article listing the computer as a Bosch > FGS-4000. It was created by Ian Pearson and Gavin Blair, who went on to do > Mainframe Entertainment (ReBoot, among others). The company is listed as > "Limelight Films" in "State of the Art," with Blair in charge of graphics. > > From emu at e-bbes.com Wed Mar 10 20:56:26 2010 From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:56:26 -0700 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> Dave McGuire wrote: >> OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not that >> expensive. > Not that expensive? I call $100-200 for a Qbus card pretty pricey. > Unibus models go for many hundreds, upwards of $1000. Sorry, but the new one want be cheaper than that. That's why I don't call them expensive. From tsw-cc at johana.com Wed Mar 10 21:30:03 2010 From: tsw-cc at johana.com (Tom Watson) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:30:03 -0800 (PST) Subject: DECwriters Message-ID: <717215.98638.qm@web112409.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Ethan Dicks wrote: >On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 4:01 PM, Dave McGuire mcguire at neurotica.com> wrote: >> On Mar 9, 2010, at 3:20 PM, William Donzelli wrote: >>> Curious... >>> >>> Who here has a DECwriter I (LA30)? This is the original early 70s >>> DECwriter made out of Flip Chips. Google for a picture. >> >> ?Not me. :-( >> >>> Who here would like a DECwriter I? >>> >>> No, I am not selling, just curious... >> >> ?Oh, I'd definitely drool over such a device. ?I've typed on no end of LA34s, LA36s, and LA120s, but never an LA30. >Agreed - I have run miles of paper through the common models of teleprinters, but have never seen an LA30 up close. >-ethan I bunch of years ago, I got an LA30 decwriter that was about to be "discarded". I got the prints as well, and I added lower case to it. I used the ADM-3A method of making the lower case characters up one dot to allow for "decenders" (the LA30 uses a 5x7 matrix). I took out the 2513 character generator, and re-wired it for a 2716 EPROM. It is in my "other" garage and works OK. Plugs into dataphone and all that. I was lucky that there was an extra pin on the character generator board (or I used the negative supply I don't remember right now). The real modification I would like to do is add a FIFO chip or some such, as padding each line with a bunch of NUL characters is a pain. I guess that connecting it to my SBC6120 would be a good retro thing. Got to get it (the SBC6120) working!! From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 21:37:09 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 22:37:09 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: On Mar 10, 2010, at 9:56 PM, e.stiebler wrote: >>> OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not >>> that expensive. >> Not that expensive? I call $100-200 for a Qbus card pretty >> pricey. Unibus models go for many hundreds, upwards of $1000. > > Sorry, but the new one want be cheaper than that. That's why I > don't call them expensive. A new one can easily be cheaper than that, assuming you don't intend to recoup all of your development expenses in the first two or three sales. I expect quite a few of these cards would sell. There's no reason to price it up in the stratosphere. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From evan at snarc.net Wed Mar 10 21:40:48 2010 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 22:40:48 -0500 Subject: Semi-OT -- IEEE 802 Committee anniversary Message-ID: <4B986640.3080709@snarc.net> I don't normally like to mix work with pleasure, but (selfish plug) here is an article I wrote today: http://tinyurl.com/ykpd6bn It's about the history of the IEEE LAN/MAN Standards Committe -- from which we all got standardized Ethernet, WiFi, Bluetooth, etc*. *< no shame > Slashdotting strongly encouraged. < / no shame >* * From emu at e-bbes.com Wed Mar 10 21:52:33 2010 From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 20:52:33 -0700 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> Dave McGuire wrote: >> Sorry, but the new one want be cheaper than that. That's why I don't >> call them expensive. > > A new one can easily be cheaper than that, assuming you don't intend > to recoup all of your development expenses in the first two or three > sales. I expect quite a few of these cards would sell. There's no > reason to price it up in the stratosphere. $ 200 is definitely even close to the stratosphere. Entertain yourself and get a quote for just the PCB. (4Layer, gold fingers, 14 routing points, non standard thickness, prototype amount 10, smt) And while you're at it, put the qbus drivers on it and a handle. Please tell me what you got so far. Stratosphere ? ;-) From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 22:02:52 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:02:52 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: <1B9B4DF8-E1CD-4576-A1F2-CE23E0E8F649@neurotica.com> On Mar 10, 2010, at 10:52 PM, e.stiebler wrote: >>> Sorry, but the new one want be cheaper than that. That's why I >>> don't call them expensive. >> A new one can easily be cheaper than that, assuming you don't >> intend to recoup all of your development expenses in the first two >> or three sales. I expect quite a few of these cards would sell. >> There's no reason to price it up in the stratosphere. > > $ 200 is definitely even close to the stratosphere. > Entertain yourself and get a quote for just the PCB. > (4Layer, gold fingers, 14 routing points, non standard thickness, > prototype amount 10, smt) > And while you're at it, put the qbus drivers on it and a handle. > > Please tell me what you got so far. > > Stratosphere ? > ;-) If you want to design it to be as expensive as possible, sure, I suppose you could do that. First, four layers isn't required for something like this, as the available board real estate is huge and the parts won't be that dense. Next, I'd make them square, and trim them with a cutter to eliminate the additional routing points. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From js at cimmeri.com Wed Mar 10 22:10:38 2010 From: js at cimmeri.com (js at cimmeri.com) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:10:38 -0500 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B986D3E.2080100@cimmeri.com> On Mar 10, 2010, at 8:19 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> I've been using a Roadrunner pen since my supply of (cheap) wire-wrap >> >> sockets dried up. Similar idea, but with enamelled copper wire >> instead. You wrap the wire round a socket pin or component lead 2 >> or 3 >> times, then solder it, run it to the next lead, wrap, solder and >> carry >> on. > > Didn't Vector have a system that used tefzel-insulated wire called > "Slit-N-Wrap" that used a wiring pen with a little spool of wire on > top? I've seen tefzel wire offered on eBay, but it always seems to > be tinned, not silverplated. From: Dave McGuire Yeah, I remember those ads. "Slit-N-Wrap...don't Just Wrap and wonder if the post cut the insulation". They were competing with the Just Wrap product, which is self-explanatory. -Dave I was looking at an old ad for Ok Tools' "Just Wrap" today. Are Just Wrap or Vector's Slit N' Wrap around anymore? Were these not popular? Seems like they would have been much easier than cut n' wrap. - John S. From brain at jbrain.com Wed Mar 10 22:13:28 2010 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 22:13:28 -0600 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> On 3/10/2010 9:52 PM, e.stiebler wrote: > Dave McGuire wrote: >>> Sorry, but the new one want be cheaper than that. That's why I don't >>> call them expensive. >> >> A new one can easily be cheaper than that, assuming you don't >> intend to recoup all of your development expenses in the first two or >> three sales. I expect quite a few of these cards would sell. >> There's no reason to price it up in the stratosphere. > > $ 200 is definitely even close to the stratosphere. > Entertain yourself and get a quote for just the PCB. > (4Layer, gold fingers, 14 routing points, non standard thickness, > prototype amount 10, smt) > And while you're at it, put the qbus drivers on it and a handle. > > Please tell me what you got so far. > > Stratosphere ? > ;-) Do you really need gold fingers? My PCB place does gold immersion for a flat $30.00 per board run. No, it's not as thick as gold fingers, but does the board really need the full plating thickness? If someone could give me a board size and a thickness, I can get a ballpark PCB quote for you all. 10 versus 100 will not make a difference to the board house, or at least has not yet made a difference. Startup cost is $50 for layout. SMT is not an issue either, unless you want the board house to assemble. If so, it's $125 for a stencil. 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 Mar 10 22:15:08 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:15:08 -0500 Subject: Semi-OT -- IEEE 802 Committee anniversary In-Reply-To: <4B986640.3080709@snarc.net> References: <4B986640.3080709@snarc.net> Message-ID: <2288FFB0-3426-4EF3-8EBF-16A675B3CDDF@neurotica.com> On Mar 10, 2010, at 10:40 PM, Evan Koblentz wrote: > I don't normally like to mix work with pleasure, but (selfish plug) > here is an article I wrote today: > http://tinyurl.com/ykpd6bn > > It's about the history of the IEEE LAN/MAN Standards Committe -- > from which we all got standardized Ethernet, WiFi, Bluetooth, etc*. For a few years when I lived in NJ, I worked for a tiny company (peaked at six employees, averaged three) owned by Jerry Clancy ("G.J. Clancy"), who sat on the 802.3 committee in the early days. He lives in Princeton Junction and his office is in Trenton. He does database application programming and desktop publishing work. I learned a great deal from him and he always had great stories to tell. He worked at IBM and wrote parts of OS/360 MVT. He's an intensely intelligent man and an extremely competent programmer. I consider myself to be an extremely anal-retentive programmer, and I owe him for that. He worked hard to instill an appreciation for strict technical correctness in me, and that has guided me through my entire professional life and hobby activities. (which are, for me, pretty much the same stuff) I was 21, I think, when I left his company. We had a bit of a falling out, and we've not spoken since. Recently (as I've become more interested in IBM's older iron) I've had a hankering to get back in touch with him. He's getting up there in years...guess I'd better do that soon. :-/ > -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 10 22:16:51 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:16:51 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> Message-ID: On Mar 10, 2010, at 11:13 PM, Jim Brain wrote: >>>> Sorry, but the new one want be cheaper than that. That's why I >>>> don't call them expensive. >>> >>> A new one can easily be cheaper than that, assuming you don't >>> intend to recoup all of your development expenses in the first >>> two or three sales. I expect quite a few of these cards would >>> sell. There's no reason to price it up in the stratosphere. >> >> $ 200 is definitely even close to the stratosphere. >> Entertain yourself and get a quote for just the PCB. >> (4Layer, gold fingers, 14 routing points, non standard thickness, >> prototype amount 10, smt) >> And while you're at it, put the qbus drivers on it and a handle. >> >> Please tell me what you got so far. >> >> Stratosphere ? >> ;-) > Do you really need gold fingers? My PCB place does gold immersion > for a flat $30.00 per board run. No, it's not as thick as gold > fingers, but does the board really need the full plating thickness? Nope. I forgot to mention that. I have several commercially- produced Qbus and Unibus boards that lack gold plating on the fingers. > SMT is not an issue either, unless you want the board house to > assemble. If so, it's $125 for a stencil. Indeed, SMT will be *cheaper* due to the reduced number of holes to be drilled. And much faster to assemble. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 10 22:39:51 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 20:39:51 -0800 Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <4B986D3E.2080100@cimmeri.com> References: , <4B986D3E.2080100@cimmeri.com> Message-ID: <4B980397.28706.2B7E625@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Mar 2010 at 23:10, js at cimmeri.com wrote: > I was looking at an old ad for Ok Tools' "Just Wrap" today. Are > Just Wrap or Vector's Slit N' Wrap around anymore? Were these not > popular? Seems like they would have been much easier than cut n' > wrap. Mouser and Digi Key still list the Slit-n-Wrap tools and wire, but the tool is crazy expensive--$232 Q1 in Digi Key. Apparently they come in at least two flavors AWG 30 and AWG 28. --Chuck From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 10 23:50:41 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 00:50:41 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 6:00 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >?By POS you mean > P/OS don't you? ?Which only runs on the DEC Pro's? ?Or am I > missing/forgetting something here? No. You are correct - I was thinking of all the places that RD51s and RD52s get, not RQDX1s, -2s, and 3s. My bad. > I wouldn't consider a lack of RD51 and RD52 support to be a deal-breaker > either, simply a nice to have. ?My key concern is that I be able to put one > of these in my /73 and boot RSTS/E, RSX-11M/M+, or RT-11 without any issues, > and ideally without needing to swap CF cards. ?Currently my main two Q-Bus > PDP-11's use removable SCSI Hard Drives than can be swapped between the two. > In the case of RT-11, the same drive can be used on my PDP-11/44. That sounds really handy. I have a couple of Qbus SCSI cards I have yet to test, but I have never run across a Unibus SCSI controller so cheap that it followed me home. I'm kinda hosed for Unibus storage except UDA50s and RL11s. I do have one or maybe two SMD or ESDI controllers (have to check the models), but I'm thin on SMD drives. RL02s are great to a point, but when you want 50-60MB, not particularly practical. -ethan From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 10 23:56:03 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 00:56:03 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> Message-ID: On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 11:16 PM, Dave McGuire wrote: >>> $ 200 is definitely even close to the stratosphere. >>> Entertain yourself and get a quote for just the PCB. >>> (4Layer, gold fingers, 14 routing points, non standard thickness, >>> prototype amount 10, smt) >>> And while you're at it, put the qbus drivers on it and a handle. >>> >>> Please tell me what you got so far. It's been a few years since I priced small runs of through-hole-heavy Qbus boards, but our Qbus COMBOARD was 4 layer, had the usual amount of gold fingers, and *bare* cost us $500 *each* in short runs. We put our own handles on them. I still have the foot-powered rivet press and (somewhere) bags of suitable rivets. PCB manufacture is cheaper than it was when we started doing 4 and 6 layer boards, but that sort of price is why we stopped making certain models of boards when the PCB stack ran out - too expensive to make a short run and not enough customer demand for a large run. > ?Indeed, SMT will be *cheaper* due to the reduced number of holes to be > drilled. ?And much faster to assemble. Recently, the 2-layer boards I've had made and priced had no surcharge for hole quantity. I'm willing to concede that's not so for multi-layer, but certainly SMT is convenient in many ways (more room to route signals on the bottom for one). I would personally not be fussy about SMT vs through-hole construction - either would be fine if it kept the price down. -ethan From ggs at shiresoft.com Thu Mar 11 01:02:55 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:02:55 -0800 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> Message-ID: On Mar 10, 2010, at 9:56 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote: > On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 11:16 PM, Dave McGuire wrote: >>>> $ 200 is definitely even close to the stratosphere. >>>> Entertain yourself and get a quote for just the PCB. >>>> (4Layer, gold fingers, 14 routing points, non standard thickness, >>>> prototype amount 10, smt) >>>> And while you're at it, put the qbus drivers on it and a handle. >>>> >>>> Please tell me what you got so far. > > >> Indeed, SMT will be *cheaper* due to the reduced number of holes to be >> drilled. And much faster to assemble. > > Recently, the 2-layer boards I've had made and priced had no surcharge > for hole quantity. I'm willing to concede that's not so for > multi-layer, but certainly SMT is convenient in many ways (more room > to route signals on the bottom for one). > > I would personally not be fussy about SMT vs through-hole construction > - either would be fine if it kept the price down. I've done budgetary pricing for my next set of boards and a quad sized board 4 layers with gold edge connectors, solder mask and silkscreen (I'm no where near the hole limit) was running ~$60-90/ea for a run of 25 boards. That also includes doing electrical tests for the boards. I've found that a quad board fills up pretty quickly when you start adding the various regulators (it's sad that you need as many as 3 or 4 different voltages), unibus transceivers, level shifters, etc, etc (I do everything in LVTTL since those parts are more obtainable but typically not 5v tolerant). Going 4 layers makes routing *so* much easier and you get better signal integrity. I'd like to see someone put together a board for $200 (complete). For unibus, you can need upwards of 10 transceiver chips and the last time I could find them they were $7/ea. Just for the bare fab + transceivers you're well towards $150 and haven't done anything yet. As far as SMT goes, I'm not up to soldering 208pin QFPs or 0603s so add in assembly costs too. Typically, what I've been doing is that the transceivers are the only thru-hole parts and *maybe* a connector (some connectors are better thru-hole because of mechanicals). In the end, assembled boards that do anything interesting is probably closer to $500 than $200 depending upon what you want to do on the board (ie what you do once you get past all the interface gunk). When I do boards, I don't do junk drawer stuff. It's all new (not scavenged) parts. You'd be surprised how fast all the little stuff adds up. TTFN - Guy From steerex at ccvn.com Thu Mar 11 03:33:09 2010 From: steerex at ccvn.com (Steve Robertson) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 04:33:09 -0500 Subject: Wirewrap boards update References: <4B9765A2.2017.4EDF39@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <002001cac0fd$e2b28690$0301a8c0@win2k> > Steve, it's hard to tell. Are all of these boards used? If not, I > may be interested in one. Cutting wire out of one of these is a very > tedious job! Anyone have any quick-and-dirty suggestions? > > Thanks, > Chuck Chuck, All the boards are previously used. I looked to see if any of them were low density but, they've all got lots of wires on them. I generally use a hand-wrapping tool to unwind the wires. I really don't know of an easier way to unwind them. It's tedious work but, if you're doing small projects like I was, you can do a small area and then cut that section from the bigger board. See ya, SteveRob From steerex at ccvn.com Thu Mar 11 03:35:06 2010 From: steerex at ccvn.com (Steve Robertson) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 04:35:06 -0500 Subject: Wirewrap boards update References: <4B9765A2.2017.4EDF39@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <002101cac0fe$2274b320$0301a8c0@win2k> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Randy Dawson" To: "classic computers" Sent: Wednesday, March 10, 2010 12:32 PM Subject: RE: Wirewrap boards update The OK hand wirewrap tool, on the opposite end is an unwrap bit. Its pretty quick, just a few twists on each post and its unwrapped. Still tedious. I dont know if there is an unwrap bit for an electric WW gun, or if they even go in reverse... How much are these going for, I would be interested in a few of them. Randy Randy, I'm asking $20 each plus postage. See ya, SteveRob From richardlynch3 at tx.rr.com Wed Mar 10 18:37:24 2010 From: richardlynch3 at tx.rr.com (Richard Lynch) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:37:24 -0600 Subject: Xerox 820-II floppy images added to bitsavers Message-ID: For those with Xerox 820-II systems, Al has kindly posted a file on bitsavers containing images of a large collection of 8" floppies primarily for the 820-II (there are a few for other systems too) that I acquired a few years ago and just finished archiving this week. There is also an excel file with details on each floppy. These came from someone who worked as a software developer in the late 70s/early 80s and many appear to contain source code. Richard From chrise at pobox.com Wed Mar 10 20:48:31 2010 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 20:48:31 -0600 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20100311024831.GV3420@n0jcf.net> On Wednesday (03/10/2010 at 04:01PM -0800), Fred Cisin wrote: > > > The requirements can vary, depending on what language you use. > > On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, Ethan Dicks wrote: > > Coke (or Jolt!) is for Assembly and C and FORTRAN. Pepsi is for > > PASCAL (and other languages I don't like ;-) (Sugar vs Sugar-free is > > target-language agnostic.) I suppose one could come up with a > > suitable cola match for FORTH and other less-commonly-encountered > > languages. > > FORTRAN was definitely a coffee language. > I don't know whether ANYTHING goes with COBOL. TAB? or maybe that is best enjoyed with Visual BASIC. -- Chris Elmquist From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 02:02:33 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 03:02:33 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> Message-ID: On Mar 11, 2010, at 12:56 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote: >>>> $ 200 is definitely even close to the stratosphere. >>>> Entertain yourself and get a quote for just the PCB. >>>> (4Layer, gold fingers, 14 routing points, non standard thickness, >>>> prototype amount 10, smt) >>>> And while you're at it, put the qbus drivers on it and a handle. >>>> >>>> Please tell me what you got so far. > > It's been a few years since I priced small runs of through-hole-heavy > Qbus boards, but our Qbus COMBOARD was 4 layer, had the usual amount > of gold fingers, and *bare* cost us $500 *each* in short runs. We put > our own handles on them. I still have the foot-powered rivet press > and (somewhere) bags of suitable rivets. > > PCB manufacture is cheaper than it was when we started doing 4 and 6 > layer boards, but that sort of price is why we stopped making certain > models of boards when the PCB stack ran out - too expensive to make a > short run and not enough customer demand for a large run. It's a LOT cheaper now than it was then, and the price drops substantially when you order a big pile of boards. For my last run of boards, qty. 1 pricing was about $35/ea, qty. 25 was about $12.50/ ea, and qty. 100 was less than six bucks. And no (Guy!) I'm not talking about junk box parts, but I don't just up and order everything from DigiKey either. I paid about ten dollars for over 5000 0.1uF 0805 bypass caps a year ago by buying partial reels. Smart shopping gets low-volume production run quantities of parts very affordably, and they're pretty much always available. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 11 03:03:06 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 09:03:06 +0000 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4B98B1CA.5050403@philpem.me.uk> Fred Cisin wrote: > FORTRAN was definitely a coffee language. > I don't know whether ANYTHING goes with COBOL. I'll say C++ definitely *isn't* a language one uses while drinking tea... and I've never tried Mountain Dew, JOLT, Red Bull or "Relentless" so I can't comment on those... My taste for fizzy drinks really has dropped off significantly over the past few years... > For Tony, I think that we can agree that tea is an acceptable beverage for > machine language and solder. Works for me. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From steve at cosam.org Thu Mar 11 03:31:20 2010 From: steve at cosam.org (Steve Maddison) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:31:20 +0100 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> Message-ID: Guy Sotomayor wrote: > I've done budgetary pricing for my next set of boards and a quad sized > board 4 layers with gold edge connectors, solder mask and silkscreen (I'm > no where near the hole limit) was running ~$60-90/ea for a run of 25 > boards. That also includes doing electrical tests for the boards. And this should easily fit on a dual height board. > I'd like to see someone put together a board for $200 (complete). For > unibus, you can need upwards of 10 transceiver chips and the last time I > could find them they were $7/ea. I'm looking into using TI's AM26S10C quad transceivers. They don't have the OR-ed enable you get on a 8641, but that's nothing that can't be remedied with a bit of logic upstream. They are about $1 a piece and come in both DIP and SOIC packages. I ordered a few but haven't played with them yet. If they do the job and will respond to 3.3V, they could even be hooked straight up to a 5V-tolerant PLD. Cheers, -- Steve Maddison http://www.cosam.org/ From roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk Thu Mar 11 04:41:19 2010 From: roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk (Roger Holmes) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:41:19 +0000 Subject: General discussion of wire wrapping, was: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: I've got 3 different size wire wrapping tools. My ICT1301 uses monster wire wrap posts, most of which are made in two halves. One half is part of a printed (or some are hand wired) circuit board and the other half is part of the rack it fits in. Bare 25 AWG tinned copper wire is wrapped around the two halves, up to 25 for each board to connect the board to the rack. No tails going off anywhere else. To swap a board all the wire wraps need to be undone before the board can be slid out. It does mean every logic pin is easily accessible for fault finding, and each one has a little hook for the scope probe to hang from. The solid one are used for connecting the cabinets together, same size tool but using sleeving on the wire. Up to 1500 connections between racks. There are ten electronic cabinets, not counting the two power supply and twelve peripherals cabinets. The tool fits in the smallest size of Stanley 'yankee' spiral ratchet screwdriver. Clockwise to wrap, anti-clockwise to unwrap. I also have a similar slightly smaller one for back plane wiring of later ICL mainframes. Uses smaller pins and smaller wire otherwise identical. The third one is the more modern standard wire wrap for integrated circuits. I'm currently using it to build a serial/parallel interface to my 1301 using 74 series TTL and a few C/N MOS chips. At work I used to have a tool for this from RS components which had a wrapper on one end and unwrapper the other end and a stripper in the middle. This has probably been chucked away and a replacement is incredibly expensive so I'm making do with wire stripping pliers and a much simpler wrapping tool I bought over the internet from the states along with a half dozen colours of insulated wire. From caveguy at sbcglobal.net Thu Mar 11 07:32:32 2010 From: caveguy at sbcglobal.net (Bob Bradlee) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 08:32:32 -0500 Subject: Sodas was Re: Soldering In-Reply-To: <201003102325.o2ANPT0X005498@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <538197.94955.qm@smtp102.sbc.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Green Tea with Ginsing and Honey goes well with Lisp :) Sinsemilla tea when available, helps with self modifing and nested pasta codeing styles. The other Bob From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 09:53:38 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:53:38 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B98B1CA.5050403@philpem.me.uk> References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> <4B98B1CA.5050403@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 4:03 AM, Philip Pemberton wrote: > Fred Cisin wrote: >> >> FORTRAN was definitely a coffee language. Indeed. I stand corrected. Coffee rings on greenbar paper come to mind. >> I don't know whether ANYTHING goes with COBOL. Therapy? > I'll say C++ definitely *isn't* a language one uses while drinking tea... > and I've never tried Mountain Dew, JOLT, Red Bull or "Relentless" so I can't > comment on those... Jolt I like, Mt Dew as well, but I'm not fond of the taste or cost of Red Bull. > My taste for fizzy drinks really has dropped off significantly over the past > few years... They keep us freely caffeinated at work where I am now (free (Lipton) tea, free coffee (no decaf), free soda (6 common varieties). >> For Tony, I think that we can agree that tea is an acceptable beverage for >> machine language and solder. I love my tea (with milk and sugar in the British/NZ/Oz style) but I don't think it puts me in the right frame of mind for hardware or software hacking - too relaxing, caffeine or no. -ethan From ggs at shiresoft.com Thu Mar 11 10:19:47 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 08:19:47 -0800 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <0ADE4712-451A-451B-A57B-3DC31CDAEBDC@shiresoft.com> On Mar 11, 2010, at 12:02 AM, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 11, 2010, at 12:56 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote: >>>>> $ 200 is definitely even close to the stratosphere. >>>>> Entertain yourself and get a quote for just the PCB. >>>>> (4Layer, gold fingers, 14 routing points, non standard thickness, >>>>> prototype amount 10, smt) >>>>> And while you're at it, put the qbus drivers on it and a handle. >>>>> >>>>> Please tell me what you got so far. >> >> It's been a few years since I priced small runs of through-hole-heavy >> Qbus boards, but our Qbus COMBOARD was 4 layer, had the usual amount >> of gold fingers, and *bare* cost us $500 *each* in short runs. We put >> our own handles on them. I still have the foot-powered rivet press >> and (somewhere) bags of suitable rivets. >> >> PCB manufacture is cheaper than it was when we started doing 4 and 6 >> layer boards, but that sort of price is why we stopped making certain >> models of boards when the PCB stack ran out - too expensive to make a >> short run and not enough customer demand for a large run. > > It's a LOT cheaper now than it was then, and the price drops substantially when you order a big pile of boards. For my last run of boards, qty. 1 pricing was about $35/ea, qty. 25 was about $12.50/ea, and qty. 100 was less than six bucks. > > And no (Guy!) I'm not talking about junk box parts, but I don't just up and order everything from DigiKey either. I paid about ten dollars for over 5000 0.1uF 0805 bypass caps a year ago by buying partial reels. Smart shopping gets low-volume production run quantities of parts very affordably, and they're pretty much always available. Passives are not an issue. The assembly house supplies them as part of the assembly fee. Even if they didn't, I'd pay them for it - I don't want to deal with parts that I have a hard time seeing much less handling. FPGAs, level shifters (or more appropriately 5v tolerant LVTTL transceivers), LVDO regulators, etc. cost $$s no matter who you buy from (and I order from a lot of different suppliers). I also design using readily available (ie in production) parts (the only exception are the unibus transceivers and I go on the secondary market for those and typically can only buy in lots of what's available...ie if somebody has 350 parts for $7/ea, that's what I get...yes I have a lot of $'s tied up in various inventory). TTFN - Guy From ggs at shiresoft.com Thu Mar 11 10:29:05 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 08:29:05 -0800 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <15A71C2B-08F9-43F5-9264-5A582599F1E1@shiresoft.com> On Mar 11, 2010, at 1:31 AM, Steve Maddison wrote: >> > > I'm looking into using TI's AM26S10C quad transceivers. They don't > have the OR-ed enable you get on a 8641, but that's nothing that can't > be remedied with a bit of logic upstream. They are about $1 a piece > and come in both DIP and SOIC packages. I ordered a few but haven't > played with them yet. If they do the job and will respond to 3.3V, > they could even be hooked straight up to a 5V-tolerant PLD. I've looked at those for a while, but haven't found anyone who actually stocks them. A number of places have them in their catalogs but have a 28 week lead time. Where did you find them? Ideally the part that I want is similar to the 26s10 but it's non-bus side signals are tri-state and LVTTL compliant. That would save me a fair number of parts. TTFN - Guy From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 10:32:54 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:32:54 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> Suppose my power company claims that the charge is $0.02407 per killowatt/hour. If I have a computer (or anything) that draws maybe 100 watts. that should be 0.1kw/h x 0.02407 x 24 hours = 5.7768 cents per day or $1.73 a month. I've been under the impression for quite some time that it costs $20 a month to run a typical modern desktop computer 24 hours a day for a month. I know there are taxes and fees thrown into the power bill. But what's wrong with my math? Was I wrong before or am I wrong now? I got this kw/h price from the power company web site burried in a pdf somewhere. It looked like the right price to me. Maybe the actual charge is much higher? brian From curt at atarimuseum.com Thu Mar 11 10:45:13 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:45:13 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B991E19.8040108@atarimuseum.com> Check your last bill, it is supposed to show the cost per kw/h used. Also most power companies - due to deregulation, and sharing of their power line infrastructure with competitors, charge a line usage fee which is generally the same cost as your power costs - even if you use the original power company - to make it fair, they too will charge the line usage fee. (how it that fair?!?!?) So if your bill was $50 this month, it is generally then $100 for the month, then the taxes, fees, etc... get heaped ontop of that and before you know it you're paying like $135 for your monthly bill... Now, once Obama passes the "Cap & Kill Jobs" energy bill, expect your energy costs to go up another 33% - oh joy!!! :-/ Curt Brian Lanning wrote: > Suppose my power company claims that the charge is $0.02407 per > killowatt/hour. If I have a computer (or anything) that draws maybe 100 > watts. that should be 0.1kw/h x 0.02407 x 24 hours = 5.7768 cents per day > or $1.73 a month. I've been under the impression for quite some time that > it costs $20 a month to run a typical modern desktop computer 24 hours a day > for a month. I know there are taxes and fees thrown into the power bill. > But what's wrong with my math? Was I wrong before or am I wrong now? I got > this kw/h price from the power company web site burried in a pdf somewhere. > It looked like the right price to me. Maybe the actual charge is much > higher? > > brian > > From geneb at deltasoft.com Thu Mar 11 10:47:11 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 08:47:11 -0800 (PST) Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Mar 2010, Brian Lanning wrote: > Suppose my power company claims that the charge is $0.02407 per > killowatt/hour. If I have a computer (or anything) that draws maybe 100 > watts. that should be 0.1kw/h x 0.02407 x 24 hours = 5.7768 cents per day > or $1.73 a month. I've been under the impression for quite some time that > it costs $20 a month to run a typical modern desktop computer 24 hours a day > for a month. I know there are taxes and fees thrown into the power bill. > But what's wrong with my math? Was I wrong before or am I wrong now? I got > this kw/h price from the power company web site burried in a pdf somewhere. > It looked like the right price to me. Maybe the actual charge is much > higher? > Brian, you might want to get yourself a gadget called a "Kill-A-Watt". You can plug your PC's power strip into it and see exactly how much power your computer consumes. They cost about $25. g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From steve at cosam.org Thu Mar 11 10:48:00 2010 From: steve at cosam.org (Steve Maddison) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:48:00 +0100 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <15A71C2B-08F9-43F5-9264-5A582599F1E1@shiresoft.com> References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> <15A71C2B-08F9-43F5-9264-5A582599F1E1@shiresoft.com> Message-ID: Guy Sotomayor wrote: > I've looked at those for a while, but haven't found anyone who actually > stocks them. A number of places have them in their catalogs but have a 28 > week lead time. Where did you find them? I got mine from Mouser just a week or two ago. > Ideally the part that I want is similar to the 26s10 but it's non-bus > side signals are tri-state and LVTTL compliant. That would save me a fair > number of parts. Planning to drive and receive from a single pin, per chance? If they'll take LVTTL on the driver input (which I'm hoping they will) you could probably get away with one 5V-tolerant tri-state buffer on the receiver output if the enables are used wisely. I was planning to try such a set-up with a 74LVC244. -- Steve Maddison http://www.cosam.org/ From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 10:52:55 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:52:55 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <4B991E19.8040108@atarimuseum.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <4B991E19.8040108@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003110852t3dd14ea5k886da160005be9d7@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 10:45 AM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Check your last bill, it is supposed to show the cost per kw/h used. Also > most power companies - due to deregulation, and sharing of their power line > infrastructure with competitors, charge a line usage fee which is generally > the same cost as your power costs - even if you use the original power > company - to make it fair, they too will charge the line usage fee. (how it > that fair?!?!?) So if your bill was $50 this month, it is generally then > $100 for the month, then the taxes, fees, etc... get heaped ontop of that > and before you know it you're paying like $135 for your monthly bill... > > Now, once Obama passes the "Cap & Kill Jobs" energy bill, expect your > energy costs to go up another 33% - oh joy!!! :-/ > I don't have a power bill handy. My wife has all that. I sent her an email asking for the real number. That number above I got from their website. I found another site that showed power cost charge averages across the country. For our area it's really something like 8.3c a kw/h. So that makes some sense. I doubt cap & trade will pass. Too many people are pissed at congress and they're already worried about reelection over the health care thing. brian From jfoust at threedee.com Thu Mar 11 11:02:07 2010 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:02:07 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> At 10:47 AM 3/11/2010, Gene Buckle wrote: >Brian, you might want to get yourself a gadget called a "Kill-A-Watt". You can plug your PC's power strip into it and see exactly how much power your computer consumes. They cost about $25. These devices might also be available on loan from your public library or energy utility. That darn socialism! A friend of mine put some of those death panels on his roof last fall and he says his energy bill went down 25% this winter. - John From keithvz at verizon.net Thu Mar 11 11:25:34 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:25:34 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B99278E.6050804@verizon.net> Tony Duell wrote: > I have noticed one curious thing. The part I worry about -- the bit I > think is going to cause problems -- is often trivial when I come to do > it. And I have problems in some totally different area. I guess it's > becuase I've thught a lot more about the bit I think is going to be hard. > Do others have this experioence? Absolutely. Yes. Usually the part of the manual I read, and re-read because I thought it was going to be a problem, usually turns out not to be. David Agans, in "Debugging Rules", makes a simple but important point, paraphrasing, "the area where you'll have problems is in the chapter you skipped, the appendix you didn't read, the area you didn't understand, and so on." > Often, for me, it's solving hte problems, and fixing the device that's > more interesting than the device when I've fixed it. Yup. It's not the destination, it's the journey! Keith From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 11:28:04 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:28:04 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <0ADE4712-451A-451B-A57B-3DC31CDAEBDC@shiresoft.com> References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> <0ADE4712-451A-451B-A57B-3DC31CDAEBDC@shiresoft.com> Message-ID: <9191B5AD-797A-47A0-BB3A-DCBEA0F8DEEF@neurotica.com> On Mar 11, 2010, at 11:19 AM, Guy Sotomayor wrote: > Passives are not an issue. The assembly house supplies them as > part of the assembly fee. Ahh, an assembly house...another expense. I build my own boards...far cheaper. But then I've not dealt with big enough quantities for that to become a problem; the largest run I've done was fifty units. > Even if they didn't, I'd pay them for it - I don't want to deal > with parts that I have a hard time seeing much less handling. > FPGAs, level shifters (or more appropriately 5v tolerant LVTTL > transceivers), LVDO regulators, etc. cost $$s no matter who you buy > from (and I order from a lot of different suppliers). I also > design using readily available (ie in production) parts (the only > exception are the unibus transceivers and I go on the secondary > market for those and typically can only buy in lots of what's > available...ie if somebody has 350 parts for $7/ea, that's what I > get...yes I have a lot of $'s tied up in various inventory). Yes, I have that problem too. :-( They sure do come in handy, though. Speaking of those 5V-tolerant transceivers, what's your favorite part these days? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 11:28:34 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:28:34 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 11:02 AM, John Foust wrote: > At 10:47 AM 3/11/2010, Gene Buckle wrote: > >Brian, you might want to get yourself a gadget called a "Kill-A-Watt". You > can plug your PC's power strip into it and see exactly how much power your > computer consumes. They cost about $25. > > These devices might also be available on loan from your public library > or energy utility. > > That darn socialism! A friend of mine put some of those death panels > on his roof last fall and he says his energy bill went down 25% this > winter. > > I can believe it. My wife called back. We're paying 12c a kw/h. I guess my math wasn't so far off. brian From geneb at deltasoft.com Thu Mar 11 11:31:20 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 09:31:20 -0800 (PST) Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Mar 2010, John Foust wrote: > At 10:47 AM 3/11/2010, Gene Buckle wrote: >> Brian, you might want to get yourself a gadget called a "Kill-A-Watt". You can plug your PC's power strip into it and see exactly how much power your computer consumes. They cost about $25. > > These devices might also be available on loan from your public library > or energy utility. > > That darn socialism! A friend of mine put some of those death panels > on his roof last fall and he says his energy bill went down 25% this winter. > It's easier to scare 'em with boogey men than it is to make 'em think. :) g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 11:36:41 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:36:41 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: On Mar 11, 2010, at 12:02 PM, John Foust wrote: >> Brian, you might want to get yourself a gadget called a "Kill-A- >> Watt". You can plug your PC's power strip into it and see exactly >> how much power your computer consumes. They cost about $25. > > These devices might also be available on loan from your public library > or energy utility. > > That darn socialism! A friend of mine put some of those death panels > on his roof last fall and he says his energy bill went down 25% > this winter. "Death panels"?? -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 11:36:57 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:36:57 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Mar 11, 2010, at 12:28 PM, Brian Lanning wrote: >>> Brian, you might want to get yourself a gadget called a "Kill-A- >>> Watt". You >> can plug your PC's power strip into it and see exactly how much >> power your >> computer consumes. They cost about $25. >> >> These devices might also be available on loan from your public >> library >> or energy utility. >> >> That darn socialism! A friend of mine put some of those death panels >> on his roof last fall and he says his energy bill went down 25% this >> winter. >> >> > > I can believe it. My wife called back. We're paying 12c a kw/h. > I guess > my math wasn't so far off. Wow, that's pretty high! Where are you? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 11 11:46:40 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 09:46:40 -0800 Subject: Wirewrap boards update In-Reply-To: <002001cac0fd$e2b28690$0301a8c0@win2k> References: <4B9765A2.2017.4EDF39@cclist.sydex.com>, <002001cac0fd$e2b28690$0301a8c0@win2k> Message-ID: <4B98BC00.11786.600DE7@cclist.sydex.com> On 11 Mar 2010 at 4:33, Steve Robertson wrote: > I generally use a hand-wrapping tool to unwind the wires. I really > don't know of an easier way to unwind them. It's tedious work but, if > you're doing small projects like I was, you can do a small area and > then cut that section from the bigger board. I do my boards a bit differently. I use single-sided FR4 PCB, usually 0.060" thick and drill holes for the pins and punch them in (slighly countersinking the foil side). It's only a little more work than using the gridded-out-lots-of-pins protoboards, but more than makes up for it in that components are easy to identify (no "forest of pins" effect) and presents a ground plane that's second to none. --Chuck From ragooman at comcast.net Thu Mar 11 11:48:55 2010 From: ragooman at comcast.net (Dan Roganti) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:48:55 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <4B991E19.8040108@atarimuseum.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <4B991E19.8040108@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <4B992D07.7000302@comcast.net> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Check your last bill, it is supposed to show the cost per kw/h used. > Also most power companies - due to deregulation, and sharing of their > power line infrastructure with competitors, charge a line usage fee > which is generally the same cost as your power costs - even if you use > the original power company - to make it fair, they too will charge the > line usage fee. (how it that fair?!?!?) So if your bill was $50 this > month, it is generally then $100 for the month, then the taxes, fees, > etc... get heaped ontop of that and before you know it you're paying > like $135 for your monthly bill... > > Now, once Obama passes the "Cap & Kill Jobs" energy bill, expect your > energy costs to go up another 33% - oh joy!!! I dislike it when people inject politics into the hobby. I know how how to read my bill, so does everyone here in PA who has Duquense Light and Equitable Gas. The Power AND Natural Gas have surged nearly 100% , yes that's DOUBLE than what it was in the past 8yrs (versus the prior decade) under the artificial energy crisis they led us to believe back then--all while being regulated. Now that we have deregulation, not only are we get better competing offers, our company *also* has been getting competing offers which is already providing a substantial savings. So screw the established power monopolies =Dan From keithvz at verizon.net Thu Mar 11 11:48:29 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:48:29 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> (sfid-20100308_133835_414545_AA9D06C5) Message-ID: <4B992CED.2050409@verizon.net> Brad Parker wrote: > Also, knowing a lot about 20V10 CPLD's isn't very much in call. But being able to bring up the internal > PPC's in a Virtex 2 was a helpful skill over the past 5 years, especially if you knew how to do it in modelsim. > So, turns out that playing with verilog and various simulators was a good use of my time. And so you have hit on my current frustration. Verilog, FGPAs, simulators, all this stuff. Fairly steep learning curve despite having some related background skills. I've been pretty unhappy with the quality of books, online materials, forums, etc. With books, I'm particularly sensitive to the way in which material is presented -- I like practical and useful knowledge. Once we start getting too abstract, I start losing interest and don't know WHY I'm reading this stuff. It hardly seems related if I can't apply what I'm reading. I've been very lucky to find ONE person I work with, who does this stuff (albeit in VHDL) for a living, who has the patience, desire to help, and excellent understanding of the subject. I find myself struggling w/ the vocabulary to explain concisely my issues. This person is a saint. :) > (did I mention writing microcode is fun? :-) Is this Microblaze, or Picoblaze, or NIOS? > I have found that if you are not completely sick of a project, it's not done. By the time it is done you are sick of looking at it, > mostly because the last 20% take forever and requires herculean perseverance. But when it's done you've learned a lot > and you have something to show for your efforts. I've had this 5-year project that refuses to die. It's probably an undergraduate level project that most students would do in a month or something. The slow progress is honestly embarrassing. I don't dedicate much time to it, but that's barely an excuse. Thanks for the reply. Keith From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 11:49:49 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:49:49 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> <15A71C2B-08F9-43F5-9264-5A582599F1E1@shiresoft.com> Message-ID: <97F29601-A31F-43C7-AA24-B521BE3B1D4B@neurotica.com> On Mar 11, 2010, at 11:48 AM, Steve Maddison wrote: >> Ideally the part that I want is similar to the 26s10 but it's non-bus >> side signals are tri-state and LVTTL compliant. That would save >> me a fair >> number of parts. > > Planning to drive and receive from a single pin, per chance? If > they'll take LVTTL on the driver input (which I'm hoping they will) > you could probably get away with one 5V-tolerant tri-state buffer on > the receiver output if the enables are used wisely. I was planning to > try such a set-up with a 74LVC244. There have been a lot of discussions about driver chips for Qbus and Unibus here over the years, usually ending in frustration. Has anyone tried to just do it with discretes? Nice little general- purpos SOT-23 transistors, both bipolar and MOSFETs, are available cheaply. Just a few days ago I bought a partial reel of 2N7002s, just short of three thousand parts, for thirty bucks, and 1200 2N3904s for $10. What would it take to do this with 2N7002s, 2N3904s, or 2N3906s? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 11:52:12 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:52:12 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 11:36 AM, Dave McGuire wrote: > I can believe it. My wife called back. We're paying 12c a kw/h. I guess > > Wow, that's pretty high! Where are you? > Chicago suburb. We have a nuke plant like 30 minutes away too. I'm not surprised though. There's probably some stupid local tax on power so someone can collect a pension while being hired back to do the same job at their old salary. brian From keithvz at verizon.net Thu Mar 11 11:51:57 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:51:57 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B950989.3032.16280CE@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net>, <4B9569F7.1000107@arachelian.com> <4B950989.3032.16280CE@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B992DBD.6010408@verizon.net> Chuck Guzis wrote: > I won't do things that I clearly don't have sufficient experience > for. When I put solid oak floors in the house, I had no problem with > laying the flooring I laid a bamboo floor in my living room/dining room, and it was surprisingly easy. Rented a floor nailer from HD, and it was actually fun. The hardpart was laying out the first row ensuring it was perfectly square with the opposite wall. I think it finished within 1/4-1/2" over the width, about 12'. Keith From keithvz at verizon.net Thu Mar 11 11:55:21 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:55:21 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: <20100308165635.H87630@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100308165635.H87630@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4B992E89.7030800@verizon.net> Fred Cisin wrote: > You have obviously never met Jeri Ellsworth. It would truly be an honor to do so! The stuff that she has done, and the stuff she works on makes me sick. I'm pretty jealous of her skills. And the more places I see her name, the sicker I get! :) Forget dinner with the president, the sports hero, I'd love to talk tech with Jeri!@# Keith From IanK at vulcan.com Thu Mar 11 11:53:34 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 09:53:34 -0800 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Brian Lanning > Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 8:33 AM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: calculating electricity costs > > Suppose my power company claims that the charge is $0.02407 per > killowatt/hour. If I have a computer (or anything) that draws maybe > 100 > watts. that should be 0.1kw/h x 0.02407 x 24 hours = 5.7768 cents per > day > or $1.73 a month. I've been under the impression for quite some time > that > it costs $20 a month to run a typical modern desktop computer 24 hours > a day > for a month. I know there are taxes and fees thrown into the power > bill. > But what's wrong with my math? Was I wrong before or am I wrong now? > I got > this kw/h price from the power company web site burried in a pdf > somewhere. > It looked like the right price to me. Maybe the actual charge is much > higher? > > brian Here in Seattle, they charge progressively: 4.39 cents per kWh for the first 10 (summer rate) or 16 (winter rate) kWh per day, then 9.14 cents per kWh for everything past that. You're right, that sure seems to add up quickly. I have one of those inline meters that not only tells me the rate of consumption but also allows me to accumulate it over a period of time for periodic consumption (like a refrigerator, that cycles on and off). It's been helpful in terms of making decisions regarding 'optional' equipment - like the dual-proc Alpha machine that draws 250 watts.... -- Ian From keithvz at verizon.net Thu Mar 11 11:58:07 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:58:07 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> Philip Pemberton wrote: > Most of the time, if I want a quick solution to the problem, I'll get a > Roadrunner pen and build up someth What's a roadrunner pen? > There are exceptions -- I've spent the past couple of years learning > about programmable logic. I started out with GALs, then moved onto > Xilinx CPLDs (XC9500XL series), and have recently (as of mid-September > last year) started playing with Altera FPGAs. Every time I've made the > jump to something else, I've built something to help learn about that > technology -- > - GALs - 6502 computer. Nearly every board has a 16V8/QP for address > decoding. > - CPLDs - LCD controller for a PIC. A 16-bit data serialiser / timing > generator to drive a small direct-drive LCD display panel. > - FPGAs - the DiscFerret. > > At least this way I end up with something to show for my effort. And > it's more fun :) And this is my current frustration! Verilog. FPGAs. Etc. Keith From keithvz at verizon.net Thu Mar 11 12:01:10 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:01:10 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <010201cabfd1$b329c690$edfdf93e@user8459cef6fa> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <010201cabfd1$b329c690$edfdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <4B992FE6.3010001@verizon.net> Andrew Burton wrote: > Considering that I have never been on a programming course and have entirely > tought myself from books and examining code, I would say that I mostly stick > to what I know and only learn new stuff (coding techniques, new languages > etc.) when I have to. In the last 5 years that includes compression (LZW and > RTE/RLE), complements (2, 9 and 10), the .BMP format (urgh, why have it all > upside down and back to front deliberately!), BCD numbers, CSV files and > various other things. Hahaha. I looked at BMP recently. For some image processing application I was thinking about writing. >[1] Motorola 68000 ASM was very easy to pick up and understand, > but I am still learning techniques to make my code more efficient :) One of my side projects is learning 68000 code for 1> eventually build my own 68k computer, and 2> understand the amiga much better. Keith From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 12:03:12 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:03:12 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003111003x624c3c70j32bed5805f6a4557@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 11:52 AM, Brian Lanning wrote: > On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 11:36 AM, Dave McGuire wrote: > >> I can believe it. My wife called back. We're paying 12c a kw/h. I guess >> >> Wow, that's pretty high! Where are you? >> > > Chicago suburb. We have a nuke plant like 30 minutes away too. I'm not > surprised though. There's probably some stupid local tax on power so > someone can collect a pension while being hired back to do the same job at > their old salary. > Turns out she calculated that number from the after-tax bill amount. So that includes all the taxes and fees also. She says all the taxes and fees are based on kw/h anyway, so it's a reliable number. It might end up being a little less though depending on how they calculate the taxes. brian From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 11 12:05:20 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:05:20 +0000 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> <4B98B1CA.5050403@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4B9930E0.2060307@philpem.me.uk> Ethan Dicks wrote: > They keep us freely caffeinated at work where I am now (free (Lipton) > tea, free coffee (no decaf), free soda (6 common varieties). I wish my work did -- the beancounters at head office sent this through the other day: ---- ATTENTION: ALL STAFF It has come to our attention that Petty Cash is being used for the purchase of inappropriate items, such as: - Food and drink: tea bags, coffee, milk, etc. - Postage stamps - [... the list goes on ...] ---- The real clincher is that HO used to send us tea, coffee and stamps with the store stock -- they later stopped that and told us to buy the stuff locally and charge it to petty cash. Now we're supposed to buy what we need, then fill out a 4-page claim form, and send that back to head office to claim our money back, which then (allegedly) goes into our respective pay packets 2 months after it's approved. Needless to say some of us aren't particularly happy with this -- we have to send lab test reports to Fujifilm every couple of weeks (hence the stamps) and nobody wants to pay for a book of stamps... or the envelopes to send the test reports back. The Area Manager is cheesed that we're "spectacularly failing" the photo-lab quality checks, but nobody wants to actually send us some stamps so we can send the reports off...... Gotta love big business. The bigger it gets, the dumber it gets. > I love my tea (with milk and sugar in the British/NZ/Oz style) but I > don't think it puts me in the right frame of mind for hardware or > software hacking - too relaxing, caffeine or no. This week, I've been drinking mostly water, but I do enjoy the occasional cup of "Tick Tock" (rooibos / redbush -- caffeine free) tea. But as you say, even that isn't ideal for coding... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 12:07:57 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:07:57 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B992CED.2050409@verizon.net> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> (sfid-20100308_133835_414545_AA9D06C5) <4B992CED.2050409@verizon.net> Message-ID: <8D489689-C6EA-4DCF-8056-2BB1ECC5A2B9@neurotica.com> On Mar 11, 2010, at 12:48 PM, Keith wrote: >> Also, knowing a lot about 20V10 CPLD's isn't very much in call. >> But being able to bring up the internal >> PPC's in a Virtex 2 was a helpful skill over the past 5 years, >> especially if you knew how to do it in modelsim. >> So, turns out that playing with verilog and various simulators was >> a good use of my time. > > And so you have hit on my current frustration. Verilog, FGPAs, > simulators, all this stuff. Fairly steep learning curve despite > having some related background skills. I've been pretty unhappy > with the quality of books, online materials, forums, etc. It's still pretty opaque, but that has changed a lot in recent years. There's some good introductory material out there, as well as at least one very good Verilog simulator that allows one to learn a great deal about Verilog without (yet) messing with the hardware. Then you can use that very same simulator for actual work. > With books, I'm particularly sensitive to the way in which material > is presented -- I like practical and useful knowledge. Once we > start getting too abstract, I start losing interest and don't know > WHY I'm reading this stuff. It hardly seems related if I can't > apply what I'm reading. I'm right there with you on that. I delayed getting into DSP on any level for exactly that reason...99% of the books on DSP are equations from cover to cover, not a damn thing about programming or implementing algorithms. I suspect that many of these books are written with the same goal in mind as most of the DSP books: To impress one's colleagues. > > (did I mention writing microcode is fun? :-) > > Is this Microblaze, or Picoblaze, or NIOS? He's talking about microcode, you're talking (presumably) about assembler.. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From healyzh at aracnet.com Thu Mar 11 12:07:25 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:07:25 -0800 (PST) Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Mar 2010, Ian King wrote: > off). It's been helpful in terms of making decisions regarding 'optional' > equipment - like the dual-proc Alpha machine that draws 250 watts.... -- > Ian It really hurt to make the decision I made this week when I discovered the powersupply on my Compaq Alpha XP1000/667 died over the weekend, but I pulled the plug on it and my VAXstation 4000/60. I'll soon pull the plug on my UNIX server as well (though I might at a later date replace it with a low-power Mini-ITX system). As I have a spare XP1000, the deciding factor was electricity and cooling costs. This will seriously cut our electricity bill, which took a sizable jump once I got my servers back online, and it will save me from having to setup some form of cooling prior to summer hitting. I will get the XP1000 working again soon, but only so I can recover data off of it. From now on it will only be powered on when I need it. :-( Zane From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 12:08:28 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:08:28 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> On Mar 11, 2010, at 12:52 PM, Brian Lanning wrote: >> I can believe it. My wife called back. We're paying 12c a kw/h. >> I guess >> >> Wow, that's pretty high! Where are you? > > Chicago suburb. We have a nuke plant like 30 minutes away too. > I'm not > surprised though. There's probably some stupid local tax on power so > someone can collect a pension while being hired back to do the same > job at > their old salary. Ugh, unbelievable. :-( -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 12:11:09 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:11:09 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: <4B992E89.7030800@verizon.net> References: <20100308165635.H87630@shell.lmi.net> <4B992E89.7030800@verizon.net> Message-ID: On Mar 11, 2010, at 12:55 PM, Keith wrote: >> You have obviously never met Jeri Ellsworth. > > It would truly be an honor to do so! The stuff that she has done, > and the stuff she works on makes me sick. I'm pretty jealous of > her skills. And the more places I see her name, the sicker I get! :) > > Forget dinner with the president, the sports hero, I'd love to talk > tech with Jeri!@# Hmm, that's a no-brainer: "I hired a good marketing team and got elected, wheeee!" vs. "I can CHASE THAT BALL, wheeee!" vs. "I can make my own chips in my house, wheeee!" Who would YOU rather have in your group of survivors after a holocaust? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 11 12:12:24 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:12:24 -0800 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B992FE6.3010001@verizon.net> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net>, <010201cabfd1$b329c690$edfdf93e@user8459cef6fa>, <4B992FE6.3010001@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B98C208.11590.779FA8@cclist.sydex.com> On 11 Mar 2010 at 13:01, someone wrote: > In the last 5 years that includes compression (LZW ... Even more OT, but potentially useful. If you have trouble emailing ZIP or RAR archives containing executables to recipients with servers that refuse such stuff (e.g. gmail), try using LHARC to archive the attachment. It's crufty enough that most spam filters don't recognize it, yet WinRAR (as well as LHARC and a few other packages) processes the archive just fine. I suspect that the same holds for .ARC, .LBR and .ZOO archives. --Chuck From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 11 12:16:13 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:16:13 +0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B99336D.5030902@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: > It's normally 30AWG, I think. I find it's useful for making links on > stripboard too, it's thin enough to run round the IC sockets neatly, you > can put 2 wires in one hole (or a wire and an IC socket pin in one hole) > if you're short of space, and it solders well. ... and it's good for "green-wire" fixes on PCBs. Especially when some idiot brings you something to fix that originally just needed a power switch, but now he's mangled it with a 100W soldering gun, now needs a switch *and* half a dozen tracks rebuilding..... > It's a pity Maplin no longer sell it. It was useful just being able to > pop into the shop and buy a couple of reels. Maplin stopped carrying useful items years ago... They're the Tandys of the 21st century. I remember when you could go in there and buy electronics kits (I've got the UA3730 Electronic Lock kit and the PIC16C84 Programmer), but now you're lucky to get soldering iron bits (thankfully Antex keep stock of nearly all the bits, spare elements and so on). Speaking of Antex, they do have this infuriating habit of making kit that *just* *won't* *die*... Ten years and counting on my 660TC soldering station, all it's had is one new element and some screws tightened (a few of the transformer laminations have apparently worked loose). Pretty good for ?70 on a Maplins "discontinued stock" deal... I do wonder if my Aoyue (read: Hakko knock-off) hot-air station will last as long, though I seriously doubt it. Sure it weighs as much as a breezeblock, but I bet there's a lead fishing weight or ten glued into the bottom of it... :) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 12:17:05 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:17:05 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B99278E.6050804@verizon.net> References: <4B99278E.6050804@verizon.net> Message-ID: I certainly do. Just last night, I was learning how to manipulate CAM software to cut out parts for a RepRap on a Shopbot. I'm fine with traditional woodworking, and with computers, but a large-format CNC router table is new to me. With lots of help from other enthusiastic newbies on the gear, we managed to cut the right shape, but at 91% of the correct size - more to learn. We always had a wood and metal shop in the garage when I was growing up, but it was traditional gear (table saw, radial arm saw, band saw, drill press, oxy-acetylene torch, arc welder, grinders, hand tools, etc.) I'm having a blast learning CAM software (the CAD stuff could sure be easier to learn, I gotta say) - and I'm finding my experience with PCBs and Gerber files has been essential to understanding the problems I've run into manipulating the Shopbot. -ethan From healyzh at aracnet.com Thu Mar 11 12:19:29 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:19:29 -0800 (PST) Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Mar 2010, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 11, 2010, at 12:52 PM, Brian Lanning wrote: >> Chicago suburb. We have a nuke plant like 30 minutes away too. I'm not >> surprised though. There's probably some stupid local tax on power so >> someone can collect a pension while being hired back to do the same job at >> their old salary. > > Ugh, unbelievable. :-( I saw the same thing in the Military. When I worked at a Mainframe site in DC, our DBA was this elderly gentleman. Due to the Labor rules they had been forced to retire him, and they then immediatly rehired him as a contractor. Zane From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Mar 11 12:22:20 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:22:20 -0700 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B992CED.2050409@verizon.net> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> (sfid-20100308_133835_414545_AA9D06C5) <4B992CED.2050409@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B9934DC.3050900@jetnet.ab.ca> Keith wrote: > I've had this 5-year project that refuses to die. It's probably an > undergraduate level project that most students would do in a month or > something. The slow progress is honestly embarrassing. I don't dedicate > much time to it, but that's barely an excuse. Well get the parts for it while you can... or a shotgun... This is a hobby, so take what ever pace you like. > Thanks for the reply. > > Keith > Ben. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 12:26:27 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:26:27 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B9930E0.2060307@philpem.me.uk> References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> <4B98B1CA.5050403@philpem.me.uk> <4B9930E0.2060307@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 1:05 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote: > Ethan Dicks wrote: >> >> They keep us freely caffeinated at work where I am now (free (Lipton) >> tea, free coffee (no decaf), free soda (6 common varieties). > > I wish my work did Fewer and fewer US companies do, despite the recommendations that cutting coffee service costs the company more in lost productivity than the coffee costs in the first place. When I was at the Pole a few years back (where the tea/hot cocoa/coffee is provided, but you've always had to pay for soda and beer), the services contractor eliminated coffee service at their Denver HQ. They "cushioned" the blow with the news that they were spending $35K/year on beverages and related expenses (cleaning, etc) and decided to eliminate free coffee to avoid laying someone off. The first response I heard was, "you need names? I'll give you a list of names!" The second response was for us at the South Pole to hold a "Coffee Social" and invite the folks from Denver to come on down to the South Pole "where the coffee is still free". Coincidentally, Dilbert was running a multi-day thread on a back-pack-sized coffee mug and the effects thereof. Nice synchronicity. > The real clincher is that HO used to send us tea, coffee and stamps with the > store stock... > > Needless to say some of us aren't particularly happy with this -- we have to > send lab test reports to Fujifilm every couple of weeks (hence the stamps) > and nobody wants to pay for a book of stamps... The usual method of handling that in the States (even in 50-person firms) is with a postage machine. We have one here - it's locked to avoid casual misuse, but it means that the office staff don't have to present themselves to a Post Office to pick up actual stamps for work-related mailings. I don't know if this is a feasible technique in the UK or not, but it's common here. -ethan From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Mar 11 12:30:56 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:30:56 -0700 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <8D489689-C6EA-4DCF-8056-2BB1ECC5A2B9@neurotica.com> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> (sfid-20100308_133835_414545_AA9D06C5) <4B992CED.2050409@verizon.net> <8D489689-C6EA-4DCF-8056-2BB1ECC5A2B9@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4B9936E0.8060501@jetnet.ab.ca> Dave McGuire wrote: >> Is this Microblaze, or Picoblaze, or NIOS? > > He's talking about microcode, you're talking (presumably) about assembler.. I thought they where, RISC cpu designs. Easy with *one* brand of FPGA's since you get fast ripple carry,and 16x1 registers for almost free. > -Dave > From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 11 12:31:25 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:31:25 -0800 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com>, , Message-ID: <4B98C67D.22278.890862@cclist.sydex.com> On 11 Mar 2010 at 10:07, Zane H. Healy wrote: > I will get the XP1000 working again soon, but only so I can recover > data off of it. From now on it will only be powered on when I need > it. :-( I was working over a 4U rackmount industrial PC that had an ATX PSU in it. This had a supposedly "hard" power-off rocker switch and the PSU even has an IEC socket on it for powering other equipment, such as a monitor. So, I figured that the power switch was a real one, that disconnected the PSU from the AC line. Imagine my surprise when I put my hand on the PSU case that had been powered off for two days and found it to be warm. It turns out that, just like the 'soft-power" ATX supplies, it keeps a small DC voltage on continuously. The secondary power outlet is switched by means of a relay. Fortunately, the thing usually is plugged into an IEC power strip that's controlled from a master switch on the rack, so it normally doesn't matter. I had the unit out on the bench and plugged in for testing. I really miss the BRS on PCs, when "off" really meant "off". --Chuck From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 12:52:10 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:52:10 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 12:19 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > > On Thu, 11 Mar 2010, Dave McGuire wrote: > > On Mar 11, 2010, at 12:52 PM, Brian Lanning wrote: >> >>> Chicago suburb. We have a nuke plant like 30 minutes away too. I'm not >>> surprised though. There's probably some stupid local tax on power so >>> someone can collect a pension while being hired back to do the same job >>> at >>> their old salary. >>> >> >> Ugh, unbelievable. :-( >> > > I saw the same thing in the Military. When I worked at a Mainframe site in > DC, our DBA was this elderly gentleman. Due to the Labor rules they had > been forced to retire him, and they then immediatly rehired him as a > contractor. > This is a huge source of the financial problems in california... firefighters making $200k a year. I don't hate them though. They're making the right amount. We should be getting what they are. And we would be if wages had followed the declining dollar. I'm sure that sort of thing is going on here in illinois. There reason I'm asking about power consumption is related to the hydroponics thing I asked about the other day. I've been shutting off computers lately to save power. And I was thinking about ways to have a computer control the hydroponics. Unfortunately, it looks like the lighting will be really expensive. You need 30 to 50 watts of light per square foot of plant crown. That makes it between 480 and 800 watts for a 4'x4' area. I'm wondering if I could come up with an algorithm that controls plant nutrients and lighting with a finer degree of control than just on at this time and off at another. Maybe I could tune the system save money on the lights and actually increase yield in the process, or adjust the distance from the lighting vs reduced light per unit area.. It would be really cool to run it on an apple 2e or c64. :-) brian From ploopster at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 13:02:37 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:02:37 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B97B4A9.14864.1839521@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net>, <4B97B4A9.14864.1839521@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B993E4D.5030707@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > When Fry's opened their first electronics store in the Bay area, they > were the cheapest place to buy Jolt cola by the caselot. For a time, > there was some bizarre chocolate-flavored diet soda (Canfields) that > enjoyed a brief bit of popularity among the technoscenti. I > suspected that BASIC programmers drank it. I thought it was > revolting. I swear by Bawls, and write a wide variety of languages on a daily basis. Peace... Sridhar From curt at atarimuseum.com Thu Mar 11 13:15:51 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:15:51 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <4B98C67D.22278.890862@cclist.sydex.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com>, , <4B98C67D.22278.890862@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B994167.8070102@atarimuseum.com> Thats a problem I have with my Mindset computers. You have to put them on switched power strips, otherwise even when off, you can put you hand along the side of the case and it feels physically warm as the p/s is still quite active. Curt On 3/11/2010 1:31 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 11 Mar 2010 at 10:07, Zane H. Healy wrote: > > >> I will get the XP1000 working again soon, but only so I can recover >> data off of it. From now on it will only be powered on when I need >> it. :-( >> > I was working over a 4U rackmount industrial PC that had an ATX PSU > in it. This had a supposedly "hard" power-off rocker switch and the > PSU even has an IEC socket on it for powering other equipment, such > as a monitor. So, I figured that the power switch was a real one, > that disconnected the PSU from the AC line. > > Imagine my surprise when I put my hand on the PSU case that had been > powered off for two days and found it to be warm. It turns out that, > just like the 'soft-power" ATX supplies, it keeps a small DC voltage > on continuously. The secondary power outlet is switched by means of > a relay. > > Fortunately, the thing usually is plugged into an IEC power strip > that's controlled from a master switch on the rack, so it normally > doesn't matter. I had the unit out on the bench and plugged in for > testing. > > I really miss the BRS on PCs, when "off" really meant "off". > > --Chuck > > From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 11 13:26:27 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 19:26:27 +0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9943E3.8050909@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: >> There's an engineering company in Huddersfield (Pennine Radio) that does > > There was a mention of a Pennine Radio set in The Radiophile magazine a > few months back. I assume it's somewhat related :-). Maybe, maybe not... > Err, you could always get the purchaser/constructor to drill his own > panel. A large number of kits that I've assembled over the years required > you to do that. Point taken, though I'd rather like to offer a ready-built version (panels pre-drilled and labelled) for those who just want a "plug in and go" solution. Although I suppose the "project kit" is a neat way around the RoHS and (possibly) EMC regulations, I doubt most folks have the tools to solder down a QFN chip -- for some odd reason, FPGA power controllers tend to come in leadless IC packages. > I much prefer thigns to come as kits (toally unsoldered), since then I > can use solder and techniques that have been used for many years and > which I trust, unlike htis lead-free stuff which is certainly not > reliabel if soldered at too low a temperature (which it often seems to be > on commertical boards...) So do I -- I've been stocking up on 60:40 solder, and I've got a tube of 60:40 solder paste in the fridge (to use with my homebrew reflow oven -- an Argos mini-oven with a thermocouple, some relays and a microcontroller bolted on). I've also got some lead-free stuff that I've been meaning to try, but I'm not going to actually use it unless forced to :) >> Knowing Epson kit, that "non-factory replacement part" (GRIN) will >> probably outlast the rest of the printer. > > THis weas an old-ish Epson (An FX-80 or MX-80 or something). It's > actually quite well made. It'll probably end up with an HPIB interface > board in it (which I do have) although I don't have the replacement > firmware ROMs to turn it into an HP82906. Oh, a dot-matrix Epson? Yeah, those things are tanks. I've got an LX80 sitting in the loft gathering dust -- IIRC it needs a new ribbon, but besides that there's not a lot wrong with it. From past experience, it's pretty hard to kill an impact printer... Unless it's a Citizen 120D+ -- the interface modules on those plug into the side of the printer, but the guide rails for said interface don't always engage properly. Net result is that the interface connectors get smashed to bits. Did I mention it was a custom part? DIN41612-style dual-row, but with 30 pins and an odd pin pitch... Citizen were extremely hesitant to give out any form of service documentation or sell any spare parts (even a print head, which is listed in the user's guide as a user-replaceable part). Pah. Last time I checked, you could still buy "genuine Epson" print ribbons and heads directly from Epson. Even things like the M180-series embedded modules are still supported... (probably because about half of Epson's desktop impact-type POS printers use that particular mechanism) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From ray at arachelian.com Thu Mar 11 13:28:51 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:28:51 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4B994473.6060801@arachelian.com> Fred Cisin wrote: > FORTRAN was definitely a coffee language. > I don't know whether ANYTHING goes with COBOL. > Hemlock goes very well with COBOL. If you survive, sulphuric acid. A nice single malt, something over 20 years old goes good with C coding. C++, however, requires moonshine. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 13:31:36 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:31:36 -0500 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) Message-ID: On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 2:02 PM, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > Chuck Guzis wrote: >> >> When Fry's... Jolt cola... bizarre chocolate-flavored diet soda (Canfields)... > > I swear by Bawls, and write a wide variety of languages on a daily basis. Bawls is good, but at my local store, I've run into a variant I like more - "Antarctica" Guarana soda from Brazil. It's stocked in the International aisles at the grocery closest to my own house (a Giant Eagle) and the store closest to a friend's house in Cleveland - so it's not just us. It tastes a bit like Bawls (vs tasting like a cola or lemon/lime drink), but I think it's smoother and less sour. It's around $3.something for a 2L, so not particularly inexpensive, but a nice treat. I have yet to throw it into the rotation for a serious hacking session, but with a day job sucking up evening hours, too, it's been a while since I've been able to get my head into that mode for extended periods of time. Summer is looking good (since I am consulting in the educational world right now). -ethan From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 11 13:33:31 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 19:33:31 +0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B99458B.6000409@philpem.me.uk> Keith wrote: > What's a roadrunner pen? Also known as a wiring pencil. Think of a mechanical pencil with the eraser replaced by a holder for a sewing machine spool. That spool holds a supply of ~30SWG enamelled copper wire. The company that makes them is, unsurprisingly, also called RoadRunner: http://www.rrunner.co.uk/ There are some photos of the pens here: http://www.rrunner.co.uk/pens/pens.htm They've been around for years, though as I understand it they're more popular in the UK than they are anywhere else. Price is about ?15 for the pen and a spool of wire, then ?7 for a pack of four spools of wire. They do the wire in 38SWG and 36SWG diameter enamelled (in a choice of four colours), and also in a 33SWG tinned copper (uninsulated) version. I built my 6502 computer with one, and they work fairly well for low-pin-count socketed PLCC parts as well. Wouldn't want to try a PGA, though. > And this is my current frustration! Verilog. FPGAs. Etc. Verilog isn't that hard to learn, it's all the other stuff that goes along with it (metastability, clock synchronisation, clock domains, finite-state machine implementation, ...) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 11 13:37:28 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 19:37:28 +0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B992CED.2050409@verizon.net> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> (sfid-20100308_133835_414545_AA9D06C5) <4B992CED.2050409@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B994678.6000901@philpem.me.uk> Keith wrote: > I've had this 5-year project that refuses to die. It's probably an > undergraduate level project that most students would do in a month or > something. The slow progress is honestly embarrassing. I don't > dedicate much time to it, but that's barely an excuse. Pfft, sounds like just about all of my projects. Even MAGMA (the driver/analysis software for the DiscFerret) is falling way behind schedule, and that's my undergrad final-year project... In any case, I've managed to scavenge a day off tomorrow (by "accidentally on purpose" forgetting to register for the university's "Research Festival"), so I'll be building a pair of load-testers and the power supply section of the DiscFerret. I need to find out how well it handles load transients and so on before I strap it to an FPGA... Thank $DEITY for programmable power supplies (with built-in volt/amp/watt meters!) and oscilloscopes... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 13:56:14 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:56:14 -0600 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 1:31 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote: > On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 2:02 PM, Sridhar Ayengar > wrote: > > Chuck Guzis wrote: > >> > >> When Fry's... Jolt cola... bizarre chocolate-flavored diet soda > (Canfields)... > > > > I swear by Bawls, and write a wide variety of languages on a daily basis. > > Bawls is good, but at my local store, I've run into a variant I like > more - "Antarctica" Guarana soda from Brazil. It's stocked in the > International aisles at the grocery closest to my own house (a Giant > Eagle) and the store closest to a friend's house in Cleveland - so > it's not just us. > I had to swear off of all of this stuff. I drink plain unsweetened black tea now. At one point, I used to drink a lot of coke. I don't drink coffee, so I'd stop at the clown and get a 32oz cup in the morning. Then I'd drink a can around 10. Then maybe go to chilis for lunch and drink 2 or 3 of those 16oz mugs, then another can later, then more for dinner. I added it all up and I think and it was the equivalent of 13 cans of coke a day, iirc. Something like 2000 calories and the equivalent of 196 sugar packets... every day. I was 300lbs and couldn't climb a single flight of stairs without stopping to take a break. I stopped drinking that stuff and went on a low carb diet. In 9 months I was 230lbs. Sometimes it sounds good to me and I'll get a can. I can't get through the whole can without giving up. It grosses me out and I'm cured for another 6 months. High fructose corn syrup is evil. And I hear the phosphoric acid leaches calcium from your bones. brian From woyciesjes at sbcglobal.net Thu Mar 11 13:56:53 2010 From: woyciesjes at sbcglobal.net (Dave Woyciesjes) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:56:53 -0500 Subject: =?windows-1252?Q?Pistol_fired_on_Olympic_honour_campai?= =?windows-1252?Q?gn_for_Turing_=95_The_Register?= Message-ID: <4B994B05.1000706@sbcglobal.net> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/03/10/turing_olympic_tribute_idea/ -- --- Dave Woyciesjes --- ICQ# 905818 --- AIM - woyciesjes --- CompTIA A+ Certified IT Tech - http://certification.comptia.org/ --- HDI Certified Support Center Analyst - http://www.ThinkHDI.com/ Registered Linux user number 464583 "From there to here, From here to there, Funny things are everywhere." --- Dr. Seuss From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 11 14:12:43 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:12:43 -0800 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> References: , <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B98DE3B.26634.E5C317@cclist.sydex.com> On 11 Mar 2010 at 13:56, Brian Lanning wrote: > Sometimes it sounds good to me and I'll get a can. I can't get through > the whole can without giving up. It grosses me out and I'm cured for > another 6 months. Yup, I gave up sweetened fizzy drinks and can't even handle a Coke if someone offers one to me. Waaaaay too sweet with a peculiar medicine taste. One cuppa coffee in the morning (it apparently has some benefit for prostate health) and plain old (Lipton's or whatever's on sale) tea for the rest of the day. I do add a little brandy to the last cup of the day, however. :) Best advice I ever got from a doctor. Him: "Do you drink?" Me: "Not really." Him: "Maybe you should start." --Chuck From ragooman at comcast.net Thu Mar 11 14:14:24 2010 From: ragooman at comcast.net (Dan Roganti) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:14:24 -0500 Subject: =?windows-1252?Q?Re=3A_Pistol_fired_on_Olympic_honour_?= =?windows-1252?Q?campaign_for_Turing_=95_The_Register?= In-Reply-To: <4B994B05.1000706@sbcglobal.net> References: <4B994B05.1000706@sbcglobal.net> Message-ID: <4B994F20.10300@comcast.net> Dave Woyciesjes wrote: > http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/03/10/turing_olympic_tribute_idea/ hear, hear ! =Dan From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 11 14:17:20 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:17:20 -0800 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B994473.6060801@arachelian.com> References: , <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net>, <4B994473.6060801@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <4B98DF50.4870.E9FEC5@cclist.sydex.com> Fred Cisin wrote: > FORTRAN was definitely a coffee language. So for those assembly programmers among us, what's the beverage? Romilar, maybe? --Chuck From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 14:25:32 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:25:32 -0500 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <4B98DE3B.26634.E5C317@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> <4B98DE3B.26634.E5C317@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <0FBEE1DC-88B6-4FA2-89D4-3A07BFF6E2F9@neurotica.com> On Mar 11, 2010, at 3:12 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> Sometimes it sounds good to me and I'll get a can. I can't get >> through >> the whole can without giving up. It grosses me out and I'm cured for >> another 6 months. > > Yup, I gave up sweetened fizzy drinks and can't even handle a Coke if > someone offers one to me. Waaaaay too sweet with a peculiar medicine > taste. Yay high-fructose corn syrup. I remember as a child in the early 1970s when Coke suddenly started tasting like crap. "Mommy, what's wrong with my Coke!" I'm buying the "Throwback" stuff (sweetened with sugar) every chance I get; it's wonderful. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 14:25:52 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:25:52 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B98DF50.4870.E9FEC5@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net>, <4B994473.6060801@arachelian.com> <4B98DF50.4870.E9FEC5@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Mar 11, 2010, at 3:17 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> FORTRAN was definitely a coffee language. > > So for those assembly programmers among us, what's the beverage? > Romilar, maybe? Mountain Dew all the way. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ploopster at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 14:25:32 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:25:32 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B98DF50.4870.E9FEC5@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net>, <4B994473.6060801@arachelian.com> <4B98DF50.4870.E9FEC5@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B9951BC.6060402@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: >> FORTRAN was definitely a coffee language. > > So for those assembly programmers among us, what's the beverage? > Romilar, maybe? Bloody maries? Peace... Sridhar From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 11 12:59:05 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:59:05 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: from "Zane H. Healy" at Mar 10, 10 05:23:18 pm Message-ID: > Of course the other thing I worry about is power supplies. In fact that's > what I've been loosing VMS boxes to. :-( Normally DEC PSUs are well behaved in that when they fail they don't do any damage to the rest of the machine. Given that, and given that there are unliklely to be any custom ICs in the PSU, what is the problem? -tony From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 14:27:45 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:27:45 -0500 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 2:56 PM, Brian Lanning wrote: > On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 1:31 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote: >> Bawls is good, but at my local store, I've run into a variant I like >> more - "Antarctica" Guarana soda from Brazil... > > I had to swear off of all of this stuff. ?I drink plain unsweetened black > tea now. I enjoy unsweetened Green Tea, but Black Tea is a different animal. > At one point, I used to drink a lot of coke... 13 cans of coke a day... That is a lot, no arguing that. > ... 2000 calories... equivalent of 196 sugar packets... every day. ?I > was 300lbs... stopped drinking that stuff... In 9 months I was 230lbs. That's a big change, but 2000 calories in Sucrose/Fructose per day is indeed formidable. > High fructose corn syrup is evil. ?And I hear the phosphoric acid leaches > calcium from your bones. Refined cane sugar (sucrose) isn't really any less evil, chemically, than HFCS, but it tastes better. I never consumed sugared drinks in those quantities, but I did drink larger amounts when I was in college, to be fair. These days, it's an occasional indulgence, not a habit. As such, I don't find the odd Coke now and then to be repulsive, nor do I crave it daily. -ethan From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 11 12:44:39 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:44:39 +0000 (GMT) Subject: AWG 30 stripping tools In-Reply-To: <4B980ECC.7000403@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 10, 10 09:27:40 pm Message-ID: > > Well worth the money, though. Admittedly I don't bother with Wire Wrap > any more, but the tool is still worth keeping around (same goes for most Why not? Wire-wrapping is easy and fast. The only downside is the cost of the sockets. Does anyone else use a Roadrunner tool? It's a point-to-point wirign system using enamelled copper wire, the coating burns off when you solder it. I've built a lot of stuff that way, including a couple of transputer systems. > tools really -- I'm a compulsive tool-hoarder...) You're not the only one. Why else would I have things like a staking set, a mainspring winder, a valve pin straighener, etc in my toolkit. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 11 12:47:02 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:47:02 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B9813DE.3070302@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 10, 10 09:49:18 pm Message-ID: > For each life you get a fixed number of lucky escapes. You never know > how many you've been allocated, or even how many you have left. Only > time you find out is when you screw up really badly and just happen to > find out that the "lucky escapes remaining" counter was at zero... If this means what I think it means, how are you in a state where you can realise that your 'lucky escape counter' as got to zero? -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 11 13:50:02 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 19:50:02 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B99336D.5030902@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 11, 10 06:16:13 pm Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > > It's normally 30AWG, I think. I find it's useful for making links on=20 > > stripboard too, it's thin enough to run round the IC sockets neatly, yo= > u=20 > > can put 2 wires in one hole (or a wire and an IC socket pin in one hole= > )=20 > > if you're short of space, and it solders well. > > ... and it's good for "green-wire" fixes on PCBs. Especially when some=20 Absolutely. Strippd, it's good for soldering along broken tracks (yes, I know the really relaible way is to solder to the nearest component lead on the track, but for a lot of things, scraping off the solder mask and soldering a wire along the track is good enough. A blob of solder over the crack most certainly isn't!). It's waht I use for cut-n-jumpr modifications to PCBs too; [...] > > It's a pity Maplin no longer sell it. It was useful just being able to=20 > > pop into the shop and buy a couple of reels. > > Maplin stopped carrying useful items years ago... They're the Tandys of=20 That's what I thought too. But when I wanted that 38swg enamelled copper wire to rewind the motors I mentioend, Maplin were the only place that stocked it. RS and Farnell don't (as far as I can see). I popped into a Maplin in London and they had a 250g reel of it on the shelf. I was amazed. > the 21st century. I remember when you could go in there and buy=20 > electronics kits (I've got the UA3730 Electronic Lock kit and the=20 Unfortunately that darn EMC directive killed off the Maplin kits (they would have had to be checked for compliance when assembled according to the instructions). Maplin still sell a few Vellemann kits, and another brand that I can't rememebr. I can remember, perhaps 20 years ago, going to the Maplin shop in Bristol and comping home with a couple of bags of ICs, conenctors, cable, etc for whatever I was building at the time. Alas not any more :-( -tony From alexeyt at freeshell.org Thu Mar 11 14:28:13 2010 From: alexeyt at freeshell.org (Alexey Toptygin) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 20:28:13 +0000 (UTC) Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Mar 2010, Brian Lanning wrote: > High fructose corn syrup is evil. And I hear the phosphoric acid leaches > calcium from your bones. According to my dentist, it is actually the dissolved C02 (carbonic acid) that leeches calcium from your teeth, so all sodas (even diet ones and not just phosphate containing ones like Coca Cola) are equally bad for you from that POV. Alexey From spectre at floodgap.com Thu Mar 11 14:30:16 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:30:16 -0800 (PST) Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B9951BC.6060402@gmail.com> from Sridhar Ayengar at "Mar 11, 10 03:25:32 pm" Message-ID: <201003112030.o2BKUG0b014950@floodgap.com> > > > FORTRAN was definitely a coffee language. > > > > So for those assembly programmers among us, what's the beverage? > > Romilar, maybe? > > Bloody maries? Bovril. You'll need the strength. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- You've got to have a gimmick if your band sucks. -- Gary Giddens ----------- From spectre at floodgap.com Thu Mar 11 14:31:38 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:31:38 -0800 (PST) Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <0FBEE1DC-88B6-4FA2-89D4-3A07BFF6E2F9@neurotica.com> from Dave McGuire at "Mar 11, 10 03:25:32 pm" Message-ID: <201003112031.o2BKVcmi010654@floodgap.com> > > Yup, I gave up sweetened fizzy drinks and can't even handle a Coke if > > someone offers one to me. Waaaaay too sweet with a peculiar medicine > > taste. > > Yay high-fructose corn syrup. I remember as a child in the early > 1970s when Coke suddenly started tasting like crap. "Mommy, what's > wrong with my Coke!" I'm buying the "Throwback" stuff (sweetened > with sugar) every chance I get; it's wonderful. I keep a couple cases on hand of Dublin Dr Pepper for that reason. My father and I did "blind" taste tests on ourselves with Mr Pibb as the control and we could clearly tell the difference between HFCS DP and Dublin DP. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- It's tradition, that makes it okay. -- Weird Al, "Weasel Stomping Day" ----- From ray at arachelian.com Thu Mar 11 14:51:45 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:51:45 -0500 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B9957E1.6000006@arachelian.com> Ethan Dicks wrote: > Refined cane sugar (sucrose) isn't really any less evil, chemically, > than HFCS, but it tastes better. > > Actually it is. While too much sugar in your blood is bad from an insulin level and resistance point of view, the glucose part of sucrose can be metabolized by any cell in your body. fructose OTOH can only be metabolized by liver cells, and in the process causes damage to your liver - as much as alcohol, and in the same ways, without any of the enjoyment. see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM That new agave syrup stuff is an abomination, it's a super high fructose syrup. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 11 14:52:10 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 20:52:10 +0000 (GMT) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: <4B9943E3.8050909@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 11, 10 07:26:27 pm Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > >> There's an engineering company in Huddersfield (Pennine Radio) that does > > > > There was a mention of a Pennine Radio set in The Radiophile magazine a > > few months back. I assume it's somewhat related :-). > > Maybe, maybe not... In case it's not obvious, 'The Radiophile' is a vintage radio mag, the set in question was a series-tring valveset using P8A (Rimlock) valves iIRC. I am not suggesting they still make such sets (or even that they still make radios), it's jus the name. Perhaps the company has been kept going all these years. > > > Err, you could always get the purchaser/constructor to drill his own > > panel. A large number of kits that I've assembled over the years required > > you to do that. > > Point taken, though I'd rather like to offer a ready-built version > (panels pre-drilled and labelled) for those who just want a "plug in and > go" solution. I learnt years ago to only provide free software as source code. Total idiots whoud hadn't a clue what to do with source code didn't bother with it at all, so the number of _really_ stupid questions dropped significantly. I suspect the same is true of hardware. If you provide it as a kit, particulalry as a kit with SMD components, you will not get total idiots buying it. And for something like this where the user has to have some clue to use it, that is almost certainly a Good Thing. > Although I suppose the "project kit" is a neat way around the RoHS and > (possibly) EMC regulations, I doubt most folks have the tools to solder It gets round the RoHS directive, but not, alas the EMC directing, at least on in the UK. That's what killed off a lot of the Maplin kits :-( The DTI were totally useless when I contacted them (wellm what would you expect>) Components do not have to meet any EMC standards (it's up to the user to use them correctly), equipment does. What is not clear is what is a 'component' and what is 'equipment'. They weren't sure about something like a bare, etched, PCB, for example. > down a QFN chip -- for some odd reason, FPGA power controllers tend to > come in leadless IC packages. > > > I much prefer thigns to come as kits (toally unsoldered), since then I > > can use solder and techniques that have been used for many years and > > which I trust, unlike htis lead-free stuff which is certainly not > > reliabel if soldered at too low a temperature (which it often seems to be > > on commertical boards...) > > So do I -- I've been stocking up on 60:40 solder, and I've got a tube of It is still avaialbe, at least if you look beyond Maplin. Why Maplin only sell the lead-free stuff (considering most of their market is hobbyists for whom the ROHS directives don't apply) is beyond me. What worries me is that if lead/tin solder ceasues to be available, what the heck tdo I use to repair classic computers (and other classic electronics). Reworking a leaded joint with lead free solder is a very bad idea... > > THis weas an old-ish Epson (An FX-80 or MX-80 or something). It's > > actually quite well made. It'll probably end up with an HPIB interface > > board in it (which I do have) although I don't have the replacement > > firmware ROMs to turn it into an HP82906. > > Oh, a dot-matrix Epson? Yeah, those things are tanks. I've got an LX80 Aren't inkjets (and for that matter laserprinters) dot-matrix printers? :-) The reason I was restoring one (just needed a good clean-up) is that these old Epsons have an internal 26 pin socket (25 pins used and a polarising key) that carries that Cnetronics signals, power lines and a couple of other signals. You could get special interface boards to go in there. The most common was an RS232 one (of which at least 4 totally different versions exist). Epson also sold an HPIB board. And HP made an HPIL board to go thre (the HP82905 and HP82906 printers are re-badged Epsons, the later with new firmware too, normally fitted with an HPIB board (also from Epson). But they also sold an HPIL model). I have both the HPIB and HPIL interfaces and want to use them... > sitting in the loft gathering dust -- IIRC it needs a new ribbon, but > besides that there's not a lot wrong with it. > > From past experience, it's pretty hard to kill an impact printer... Those of us who've had to repair an LA36 might disagree :-). > Unless it's a Citizen 120D+ -- the interface modules on those plug into > the side of the printer, but the guide rails for said interface don't > always engage properly. Net result is that the interface connectors get > smashed to bits. My DEC LA324 had an amazing array of faults when I got it. From memory, a couple of RAMs and one of the 3 processors (fortunately ROMless) had all failed. Why I don't know... > > Did I mention it was a custom part? DIN41612-style dual-row, but with 30 > pins and an odd pin pitch... Citizen were extremely hesitant to give out > any form of service documentation or sell any spare parts (even a print > head, which is listed in the user's guide as a user-replaceable part). Pah. BAck whe nthe machines were in production I had no problems getting Epson spares (or service manuals). -tony From oltmansg at bellsouth.net Thu Mar 11 14:59:25 2010 From: oltmansg at bellsouth.net (Geoff Oltmans) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:59:25 -0600 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <4B9957E1.6000006@arachelian.com> References: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> <4B9957E1.6000006@arachelian.com> Message-ID: Cane sugar and HFCS have about the same ratio of glucose to fructose. Sucrose is broken down into glucose and fructose during digestion. On Mar 11, 2010, at 2:51 PM, Ray Arachelian wrote: > Ethan Dicks wrote: >> Refined cane sugar (sucrose) isn't really any less evil, chemically, >> than HFCS, but it tastes better. >> >> > Actually it is. While too much sugar in your blood is bad from an > insulin level and resistance point of view, the glucose part of sucrose > can be metabolized by any cell in your body. fructose OTOH can only be > metabolized by liver cells, and in the process causes damage to your > liver - as much as alcohol, and in the same ways, without any of the > enjoyment. > > see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM > > That new agave syrup stuff is an abomination, it's a super high fructose > syrup. > From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Thu Mar 11 15:12:08 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:12:08 -0800 Subject: prototyping/repairing wire gauges / was Re: Disc analyser news update References: Message-ID: <4B995CA8.B4DA25B6@cs.ubc.ca> Tony Duell wrote: > > > > It's normally 30AWG, I think. I find it's useful for making links on=20 > > > stripboard too, it's thin enough to run round the IC sockets neatly, yo= > > u=20 > > > can put 2 wires in one hole (or a wire and an IC socket pin in one hole= > > )=20 > > > if you're short of space, and it solders well. > > > > ... and it's good for "green-wire" fixes on PCBs. Especially when some=20 > That's what I thought too. But when I wanted that 38swg enamelled copper > wire to rewind the motors I mentioend, Maplin were the only place that Should note in this and earlier discussion that at the smaller diameters there is a substantial difference between the AWG / SWG sizes. AWG (American Wire Gauge) is much finer for a given # than SWG (Imperial Standard), e.g.: # SWG AWG 38 0.0060 0.0040 http://www.simetric.co.uk/siwire.htm From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Mar 11 15:18:36 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:18:36 -0700 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B995E2C.5060307@jetnet.ab.ca> Tony Duell wrote: > If this means what I think it means, how are you in a state where you can > realise that your 'lucky escape counter' as got to zero? When the smell of brimstone goes with it. > -tony From cfox1 at cogeco.ca Thu Mar 11 15:47:09 2010 From: cfox1 at cogeco.ca (Charles E. Fox) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:47:09 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.co m> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8jdalf$2qf6ji@fipsb02.cogeco.net> At 11:32 AM 3/11/2010, you wrote: >Suppose my power company claims that the charge is $0.02407 per >killowatt/hour. If I have a computer (or anything) that draws maybe 100 >watts. that should be 0.1kw/h x 0.02407 x 24 hours = 5.7768 cents per day >or $1.73 a month. I've been under the impression for quite some time that >it costs $20 a month to run a typical modern desktop computer 24 hours a day >for a month. I know there are taxes and fees thrown into the power bill. >But what's wrong with my math? Was I wrong before or am I wrong now? I got >this kw/h price from the power company web site burried in a pdf somewhere. >It looked like the right price to me. Maybe the actual charge is much >higher? > >brian > >No virus found in this incoming message. >Checked by AVG - www.avg.com >Version: 9.0.733 / Virus Database: 271.1.1/2736 - Release Date: >03/11/10 02:33:00 I don't know how things are where you are located, but in good old Windsor Ontario my electricity bill for an unoccupied apartment was as follows: Electricity: 33.206 kWh @0.058 / kWh $ 1.93 Delivery $ 12.65 Regulatory charges $ 0.46 Debt retirement charges $ 0.22 GST $ 0.77 TOTAL $ 16.03 Cheers Charlie Fox From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 11 15:54:28 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 21:54:28 +0000 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B994473.6060801@arachelian.com> References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net> <4B994473.6060801@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <4B996694.7000500@philpem.me.uk> Ray Arachelian wrote: > Hemlock goes very well with COBOL. If you survive, sulphuric acid. > > A nice single malt, something over 20 years old goes good with C coding. > C++, however, requires moonshine. If you'd said that on IRC, I'd have posted it to bash.org (the Quotes Database) by now... :) I'm still going to add it to the quips-list on my Bugzilla install, though :) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From keithvz at verizon.net Thu Mar 11 15:54:20 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:54:20 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> Brian Lanning wrote: > There reason I'm asking about power consumption is related to the > hydroponics thing I asked about the other day. I've been shutting off > computers lately to save power. And I was thinking about ways to have a > computer control the hydroponics. Unfortunately, it looks like the lighting > will be really expensive. You need 30 to 50 watts of light per square foot > of plant crown. That makes it between 480 and 800 watts for a 4'x4' area. Just grow marijuana. The return on your investment makes it easy to justify using all the power on the lights. I found it interesting that power companies report potentially violators to the police because their power usage patterns aren't typical -- especially overnight. Keith From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 15:57:38 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:57:38 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 3:54 PM, Keith wrote: > Just grow marijuana. The return on your investment makes it easy to > justify using all the power on the lights. > > I found it interesting that power companies report potentially violators to > the police because their power usage patterns aren't typical -- especially > overnight. > I heard that the DEA has helicopters that fly around looking for light of a certain wavelength (probably high pressure sodium) leaking from buildings, then show up and raid the place. When the cops show up, I'll offer them a tomato. brian From keithvz at verizon.net Thu Mar 11 16:00:01 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:00:01 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B9967E1.4080809@verizon.net> Dave McGuire wrote: >> I can believe it. My wife called back. We're paying 12c a kw/h. I >> guess >> my math wasn't so far off. > > Wow, that's pretty high! Where are you? > > -Dave http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/table5_6_a.html (from Nov 2009) I pay about $0.12 here too. How's this high? US average is $0.1133 ? Hawaii pays $0.26. Now that's high. :) Keith From wdonzelli at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 16:01:17 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:01:17 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > When the cops show up, I'll offer them a tomato. That would be a mistake. Big mistake. -- Will From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 11 16:03:06 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:03:06 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <4B9967E1.4080809@verizon.net> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <4B9967E1.4080809@verizon.net> Message-ID: <34FE18C6-3F91-48CE-8749-012F25C73446@neurotica.com> On Mar 11, 2010, at 5:00 PM, Keith wrote: >>> I can believe it. My wife called back. We're paying 12c a kw/ >>> h. I guess >>> my math wasn't so far off. >> Wow, that's pretty high! Where are you? >> -Dave > > http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/table5_6_a.html > (from Nov 2009) > > I pay about $0.12 here too. How's this high? US average is $0.1133 ? > > Hawaii pays $0.26. Now that's high. :) High compared to me, at about $0.09/kWh. I don't really care to keep up with the national averages. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From oltmansg at bellsouth.net Thu Mar 11 16:03:50 2010 From: oltmansg at bellsouth.net (Geoff Oltmans) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:03:50 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <2E70F4AF-E654-425B-BF74-96285123E257@bellsouth.net> On a somewhat related topic, my dad is a helicopter instructor pilot for the Air Force. He has said that in the past he'd fly over a large field of corn, and see (ahem) something else planted smack dab in the middle. On Mar 11, 2010, at 3:57 PM, Brian Lanning wrote: > On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 3:54 PM, Keith wrote: > >> Just grow marijuana. The return on your investment makes it easy to >> justify using all the power on the lights. >> >> I found it interesting that power companies report potentially violators to >> the police because their power usage patterns aren't typical -- especially >> overnight. >> > > I heard that the DEA has helicopters that fly around looking for light of a > certain wavelength (probably high pressure sodium) leaking from buildings, > then show up and raid the place. > > When the cops show up, I'll offer them a tomato. > > brian From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Mar 11 16:05:00 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:05:00 -0700 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B99690C.6040308@jetnet.ab.ca> William Donzelli wrote: >> When the cops show up, I'll offer them a tomato. > > That would be a mistake. Big mistake. More of a mistake to throw it! > -- > Will BTW, I thought most electric power stations burn coal. How does that relate to oil and gas price increases. From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 16:06:24 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:06:24 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003111406y7f65e845nb125068f1bdfd2b8@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 4:01 PM, William Donzelli wrote: > > When the cops show up, I'll offer them a tomato. > > That would be a mistake. Big mistake. > > Why would that be a mistake? They'll be standing in the basement next to the tomato plant. If they just show up at the door, I'll ask where the warrant is. But I doubt they'll bother themselves with a little formality like that. brian From geneb at deltasoft.com Thu Mar 11 16:08:42 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:08:42 -0800 (PST) Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Mar 2010, Brian Lanning wrote: > On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 3:54 PM, Keith wrote: > >> Just grow marijuana. The return on your investment makes it easy to >> justify using all the power on the lights. >> >> I found it interesting that power companies report potentially violators to >> the police because their power usage patterns aren't typical -- especially >> overnight. >> > > I heard that the DEA has helicopters that fly around looking for light of a > certain wavelength (probably high pressure sodium) leaking from buildings, > then show up and raid the place. > > When the cops show up, I'll offer them a tomato. > ...and then sue them for illegal search. :) g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From jfoust at threedee.com Thu Mar 11 16:10:39 2010 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:10:39 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com > References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <201003112211.o2BMBHqV080031@billY.EZWIND.NET> At 03:57 PM 3/11/2010, Brian Lanning wrote: >When the cops show up, I'll offer them a tomato. Could be difficult with your hands zip-tied behind your back. - John From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 16:17:46 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:17:46 -0500 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <4B9957E1.6000006@arachelian.com> References: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> <4B9957E1.6000006@arachelian.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 3:51 PM, Ray Arachelian wrote: > Ethan Dicks wrote: >> Refined cane sugar (sucrose) isn't really any less evil, chemically, >> than HFCS, but it tastes better. >> > Actually it is. ?While too much sugar in your blood is bad from an > insulin level and resistance point of view, the glucose part of sucrose > can be metabolized by any cell in your body. Agreed. >?fructose OTOH can only be > metabolized by liver cells, and in the process causes damage to your > liver - as much as alcohol, and in the same ways, without any of the > enjoyment. Also agreed. Sucrose is a disaccharide consisting of one glucose linked to one fructose. Pure sucrose is, therefore, exactly 50% glucose and 50% fructose. HFCS is a complex mix of compounds with various formulations. The one that I'm most aware of is "HFCS 55" which is 55% fructose and 45% glucose (I've just been reading about HFCS 42, used in baked goods, but when people are talking about "evil HFCS", they mean HFCS 55). It's called _HF_CS because it has a higher concentration of fructose than "pure corn syrup" (which is, AFAIK, pretty much all glucose), not because it's all that much higher than sucrose. Substitute those numbers in the sentence above and you get... "50/50 isn't really less evil, chemically, than 55/45, but it tastes better." Perhaps it's 5% less evil than HFCS? I am enjoying the cane sugar renaissance - I think cane sugar sweetened caffeinated beverages taste substantially better - i.e., the way they used to taste in the US when we were kids (and the way they taste the rest of the world over where corn products cost more). In relation to hacking - on a warm summer evening, an icy-cold sucrose-sweetened Coke (plus an optional "circular debugger") is a great way to keep in a hackish state of mind for hours. The effect is heightened when preceded by a Cantonese or Szechuan evening meal (cardboard cartons optional). I have produced some great code with such preparations. Consider them all material components for the spell "Create Wizardly Hack" - tamper with the ingredients at your own peril. -ethan From teoz at neo.rr.com Thu Mar 11 16:25:52 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:25:52 -0500 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) References: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com><4B9957E1.6000006@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <06EB9B28607243ED93F7A90C2832C49F@dell8300> I gave up drinking cola with caffeine and now mostly drink 7-up with artificial sweeteners (you end up getting a sweet tooth late in the day). I used to guzzle mountain dew in the morning when I worked and I found if I didn't my mind would be a little cloudy until I did so I gave it up. Yes, you do lose a bunch of weight when switching to diet pop, but you gain it back slowly when you get a craving for sweets (you body doesn'y like to be fooled by fake sweetener). Look at the contents of anything made in the US (toothpaste, tomatoe sause, packaged food, etc), they all have sweetener in it. I used to love orange crush back when it was in bottles and had sugar. Even with the lined aluminum cans you still get a slight metalic taste. From spectre at floodgap.com Thu Mar 11 16:32:36 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:32:36 -0800 (PST) Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <4B9957E1.6000006@arachelian.com> from Ray Arachelian at "Mar 11, 10 03:51:45 pm" Message-ID: <201003112232.o2BMWaDt013532@floodgap.com> > > Refined cane sugar (sucrose) isn't really any less evil, chemically, > > than HFCS, but it tastes better. > > Actually it is. While too much sugar in your blood is bad from an > insulin level and resistance point of view, the glucose part of sucrose > can be metabolized by any cell in your body. fructose OTOH can only be > metabolized by liver cells, and in the process causes damage to your > liver - as much as alcohol, and in the same ways, without any of the > enjoyment. > > see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM > > That new agave syrup stuff is an abomination, it's a super high fructose > syrup. K, time for medical reality before this swings too wide. - Truth: fructose metabolism is essentially exclusive to the liver. - Truth: people who report a large amount of fructose intake also have higher rates of non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, and upregulation of the enzymes responsible for fructose metabolism in liver biopsies. - Not yet? truth: an actual smoking gun. Many such studies haven't controlled for other liver-deleterious dietary problems (and to their credit admit it), and because of recall bias, may not be able to control for it by design. It is entirely possible that it's a marker, not a cause, and other factors may lead to the liver damage. See, for example, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2423467/?tool=pmcentrez http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15051594 [full text available] If we wanted to be totally non-evil, then we should be all eating glucose, but if you've tasted glucose you will also realize that based on the taste demands of the populace, that won't happen. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Mistakes are often the stepping stones to catastrophic failure. ------------ From oltmansg at bellsouth.net Thu Mar 11 16:37:13 2010 From: oltmansg at bellsouth.net (Geoff Oltmans) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:37:13 -0600 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <201003112232.o2BMWaDt013532@floodgap.com> References: <201003112232.o2BMWaDt013532@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <894261E9-105B-48DB-BF33-A32BEDC304C3@bellsouth.net> One thing to note about fructose as well.. it's in all fruit. Not exactly evil. On Mar 11, 2010, at 4:32 PM, Cameron Kaiser wrote: >>> Refined cane sugar (sucrose) isn't really any less evil, chemically, >>> than HFCS, but it tastes better. >> >> Actually it is. While too much sugar in your blood is bad from an >> insulin level and resistance point of view, the glucose part of sucrose >> can be metabolized by any cell in your body. fructose OTOH can only be >> metabolized by liver cells, and in the process causes damage to your >> liver - as much as alcohol, and in the same ways, without any of the >> enjoyment. >> >> see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM >> >> That new agave syrup stuff is an abomination, it's a super high fructose >> syrup. > > K, time for medical reality before this swings too wide. > > - Truth: fructose metabolism is essentially exclusive to the liver. > > - Truth: people who report a large amount of fructose intake also have > higher rates of non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, and upregulation of the > enzymes responsible for fructose metabolism in liver biopsies. > > - Not yet? truth: an actual smoking gun. Many such studies haven't controlled > for other liver-deleterious dietary problems (and to their credit admit > it), and because of recall bias, may not be able to control for it by > design. It is entirely possible that it's a marker, not a cause, and other > factors may lead to the liver damage. See, for example, > http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2423467/?tool=pmcentrez > http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15051594 [full text available] > > If we wanted to be totally non-evil, then we should be all eating glucose, > but if you've tasted glucose you will also realize that based on the taste > demands of the populace, that won't happen. > > -- > ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- > Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com > -- Mistakes are often the stepping stones to catastrophic failure. ------------ From robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com Thu Mar 11 16:37:59 2010 From: robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com (Rob Jarratt) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 22:37:59 -0000 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> Message-ID: <004601cac16b$820f1b50$862d51f0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Rob Jarratt > Sent: 10 March 2010 21:49 > To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts' > Cc: 'David Riley' > Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 > > There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which ended > up > with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to build > an > FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD interface > on > the other which anyone could then program to emulate any > disk/controller > they like. I have been in touch with him to see how much interest he > has > had, because he needs a minimum number of about 10 to make it viable, > but so > far there has only been me and one other person showing an interest. > David > reckons they would come to a little over $200 each (possibly less if > there > is more interest). David is not yet on cctalk so he agreed to let me > cross-post this to cctalk on his behalf, but I have cc'd him so you can > reply direct. > > Regards > > Rob As David is currently unable to post to the list he has asked me to post the following on his behalf: ------------- So it seems there's at least quite a bit of discussion generated about the board. For those curious, here are the major design points (LONG email ahead): - The main QBUS interface (before the buffers) will be an FPGA (Altera Cyclone III EP3C16 at this point, for cost, but the same footprint will fit a 3C25 or 3C40 as well). This FPGA should be large enough to fit even rather complex devices fairly handily (you can make a soft-core 32-bit processor in less than 1k logic elements, and a 3C16 has 16k). This is, of course, assuming you build it all in the FPGA fabric; you don't have to because... - The FPGA will be bolted to the bus (16-bit, of course) of a Freescale MCF5208. This is a ColdFire (68k architecture) which runs at 166 MHz (88 MHz external bus) and also contains a 10/100 Ethernet controller. The controller requires an external PHY, but this is actually an advantage; by connecting the processor's MII to both a real 10/100 PHY and the FPGA, we can provide both RJ45 for straight-up Ethernet connections and build an MII-to-AUI bridge in the FPGA (not a day's work, for sure, but certainly doable). This means you could use this as a replacement DELQA if you have a cable kit for the external AUI connector; connect to thick/thinnet, etc. Alternatively, you could stream hard disk/tape images from a remote file server. Of course, it'll have a handful of serial consoles. In theory, you could make a CPU board with SLUs and all 4 MB RAM out of the FPGA, but this would be an extensive design effort. As to whomever asked for a clock, that should work as well. Anything you can do with a QBUS card can be done on the FPGA, it's just a matter of how much work you want to put into it. :-) I currently have 32 MB RAM and 4 MB flash slated for the processor (the processor should read the FPGA image off the SD card). - My vision for the basic build of the FPGA would actually be to just provide an interrupt-based bus interface for the processor. If the processor defines apertures for the CSRs and uses an ISR to provide the data for the reads and the writes, a 166MHz processor ought to be able to respond quickly enough to make for a fairly speedy card. If that's not enough performance, one can always implement the device in the actual FPGA fabric (if one is good with FPGAs, which can take a while for people who aren't hardware designers). Additionally, we should be able to support multiple "virtual" cards in a single board; the only limitation is the number of apertures that will fit nicely in the FPGA and the overhead of the software running on processor. At least 4 should be easily achievable. A simple DMA controller in the FPGA would go a long way towards making the performance of mass storage acceptable (processor DMAs into FPGA, FPGA DMAs into QBUS, or vice versa). This means that even software-only people should be able to implement the devices in an emulator-like fashion (without excluding the possibility of actual FPGA implementations). - Since the Coldfire is 68k and has excellent GCC support, it can be programmed entirely with Free Software. The actual hardware to program it costs $80 standalone (more or less; depends on who's building it), but most of that is assembly and PCB costs. I could integrate the same hardware onto the board for an additonal $5 or so instead. The FPGA can be programmed entirely with Altera's free (not to be confused with Free) Web Edition version of Quartus, but to program it you need either a) a $75 JTAG cable to program it or b) something running on the ColdFire to program the FPGA image (which will be the default mode on boot). The JTAG cable gives you the advantage of running the FPGA-based logic analyzer. - And of course, yes, it will be a fully open architecture. I'm using KiCAD (FOSS) to do the schematic and layout. Anyone should be able to make the board if they want, but it'll be expensive for small runs. For those of you who think $200 each is in the stratosphere, here's my current (rough) BOM at two different run sizes: Part Description Qty Price at 10 Price at 25 ------------------------------------------------------------------ EP3C16E144C8N FPGA (EQFP-144) 1 26.70 26.70 DP83848 10/100 PHY 1 4.29 3.50 SST39VF3201 2M x 16 NOR flash 1 3.61 3.61 IS43R16160B-6 16M x 16 DDR RAM 1 6.00 5.40 EN5335QI DC-DC converter 3 5.51(16.53) 5.41(16.23) SN74AS641DW Octal bus xcvr 4 4.80(19.20) 4.04(16.16) J0026D21ENL RJ45 w/magnetics 1 4.825 4.825 Assembly aapcb.com, 50 parts 1 47.00 39.80 PCB 4pcb.com 1 72.44 36.26 --------------------------------------------------------------- Total 200.59 152.48 This doesn't include the scads of little resistors and capacitors and a few other cheap parts I'd need to place, which while very cheap may drive the cost of assembly up. The PCB pricing is for a 5.3" x 8.4" board, 1 edge gold fingers, 4 layers, controlled stackup (There are too many high-speed buses on this thing to risk a 2-layer board and no controlled impedance). Eliminating the gold fingers only brings the price down about $10. My $200 figure was a sort of back-of-the envelope calculation (I hadn't made out a detailed costed BOM yet). The cost is still subject to change, and a number of the parts (particularly the MCF5208) are long-lead (14 weeks and no stock anywhere). Most pricing was done at Mouser except for the components I couldn't find there (the PHY and the FPGA, and the RJ45 was cheaper at DK), which came from Digi-Key. This also doesn't include the AUI transceiver buffering, which I haven't yet worked out, and I still haven't 100% finalized the arrangement of the QBUS buffers (as it is, I'll be using transistors for a few of them since the signals don't all fit nicely in the mold of a '245-style transceiver like the 74AS641). Also, someone mentioned nonstandard thickness. As far as I was aware, the boards were 62 mils, but I haven't measured (and couldn't find a reference anywhere, and don't have a micrometer). Anyone know otherwise? In any case, I hope this answers a number of the questions out there. My plan is to implement the basic FPGA hardware mentioned as well as an implementation of the software stack for at least a few of the controller cards I have in my possession. The user end (serial console) of the processor should be able to load board personalities from the SD card as well, so setting up a repository of personalities (if others develop any) would be the way to go there. From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 11 16:38:27 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 22:38:27 +0000 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9970E3.6040406@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: >> For each life you get a fixed number of lucky escapes. You never know >> how many you've been allocated, or even how many you have left. Only >> time you find out is when you screw up really badly and just happen to >> find out that the "lucky escapes remaining" counter was at zero... > > If this means what I think it means, how are you in a state where you can > realise that your 'lucky escape counter' as got to zero? When you either bump into Saint Peter at the Pearly Gates, or the Ferryman at the bank of the Styx. Abandon hope, all ye who enter here......... (substitute your own religious beliefs regarding death above) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From ploopster at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 16:41:57 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:41:57 -0500 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) In-Reply-To: <4B9970E3.6040406@philpem.me.uk> References: <4B9970E3.6040406@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4B9971B5.8070309@gmail.com> Philip Pemberton wrote: > Tony Duell wrote: >>> For each life you get a fixed number of lucky escapes. You never know >>> how many you've been allocated, or even how many you have left. Only >>> time you find out is when you screw up really badly and just happen >>> to find out that the "lucky escapes remaining" counter was at zero... >> >> If this means what I think it means, how are you in a state where you >> can realise that your 'lucky escape counter' as got to zero? > > When you either bump into Saint Peter at the Pearly Gates, or the > Ferryman at the bank of the Styx. > > Abandon hope, all ye who enter here......... You mean you're forced to complete a production code project in INTERCAL? Peace... Sridhar From pete at dunnington.plus.com Thu Mar 11 17:08:57 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 23:08:57 +0000 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B997809.1080803@dunnington.plus.com> On 11/03/2010 21:57, Brian Lanning wrote: > I heard that the DEA has helicopters that fly around looking for light of a > certain wavelength (probably high pressure sodium) leaking from buildings, > then show up and raid the place. A couple of years ago the police here raided a colleague's house because the police helicopter's IR cameras showed the house as emitting a lot of energy, and that's a sign of cannabis farms. In fact, rather embarrassingly, it was just a case of poor insulation. I doubt the DEA's choppers are actually looking for visible light -- just "bright" infrared emission. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2474184/Poor-insulation-led-to-drugs-raid-on-police-officers-home.html or if you want to see pictures from the chopper IR camera http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1039768/Police-raid-home-Blunkett-Bobby-infrared-helicopter-mistook-bad-insulation-cannabis-factory.html -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From wdonzelli at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 17:15:06 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:15:06 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003111406y7f65e845nb125068f1bdfd2b8@mail.gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com> <3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com> <6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com> <4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net> <6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003111406y7f65e845nb125068f1bdfd2b8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > Why would that be a mistake? ?They'll be standing in the basement next to > the tomato plant. ?If they just show up at the door, I'll ask where the > warrant is. ?But I doubt they'll bother themselves with a little formality > like that. Have you noticed that quite a few hydroponics supplies dealers tend to do a LOT of tomato business? -- Will From teoz at neo.rr.com Thu Mar 11 17:19:26 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:19:26 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com><6dbe3c381003110952r4eebc3b4y4d02e0bddd72e7a5@mail.gmail.com><3B1716EA-5D93-48C0-A912-D1F805A424F6@neurotica.com><6dbe3c381003111052m3b54e63fia896d648a5c3fe8a@mail.gmail.com><4B99668C.5080002@verizon.net><6dbe3c381003111357ud9ec47er39261ea3e2b5f829@mail.gmail.com><6dbe3c381003111406y7f65e845nb125068f1bdfd2b8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: I know a few people who raise plants in apartments. In the summer they have them out in pots out back, in the winter they don't have enough (or any) window space so they use a bunch of grow lights to keep them alive. People do use grow lights for things other then growing pot. ----- Original Message ----- From: "William Donzelli" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 6:15 PM Subject: Re: calculating electricity costs > Why would that be a mistake? They'll be standing in the basement next to > the tomato plant. If they just show up at the door, I'll ask where the > warrant is. But I doubt they'll bother themselves with a little formality > like that. Have you noticed that quite a few hydroponics supplies dealers tend to do a LOT of tomato business? -- Will From useddec at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 18:30:52 2010 From: useddec at gmail.com (Paul Anderson) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:30:52 -0600 Subject: rare and not-so rare systems available In-Reply-To: References: <624966d61003082135s5a542793h2da856045fa2fc38@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <624966d61003111630w4d2d659bne81f4c4d76df8813@mail.gmail.com> Hi Tony, Interested in trading the zeiss microscope for something else? Thanks, Paul On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 2:08 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > > > > I collect Zeiss equipment, and almost anything optical made brass. But a > > Would you believe a freind of mine nearly threw out a Zeiss microscope. > Fairly modern, binocular eeyepieces, but one objective (and a beam > splitter), so you don't get stereoscopic views of the object. It's still > a very nice instrument... > > Notice I said 'nearly threw out'. I grabbed it... > > I must be the only person who when asked to recomend a medium format > camera (price not being a criterion) didn't recomend a 'blad.... > > -tony > > From healyzh at aracnet.com Thu Mar 11 21:13:08 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 19:13:08 -0800 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: At 6:59 PM +0000 3/11/10, Tony Duell wrote: > > Of course the other thing I worry about is power supplies. In fact that's >> what I've been loosing VMS boxes to. :-( > >Normally DEC PSUs are well behaved in that when they fail they don't do >any damage to the rest of the machine. Given that, and given that there >are unliklely to be any custom ICs in the PSU, what is the problem? Face it Tony, we're not all wizards like you. :-( Though given the necessary parts, I could fix the one in my VAXstation 4000/vlc (fans). The PSU in the XP1000 and the way that machine is acting has me more than a little concerned, I'm afraid it might have taken something with it. I discovered the problem on Monday, and haven't had time to take a serious look at it. Though as long as the CPU board, and the SCSI boards in it are fine, I should be okay. My other XP1000 is only a 500Mhz, so I'd prefer not to loose the 667Mhz CPU. Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 jdbryan at acm.org Thu Mar 11 21:47:03 2010 From: jdbryan at acm.org (J. David Bryan) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 22:47:03 -0500 Subject: Anyone running RTE-M on an HP 21MX series M, E, or F? In-Reply-To: References: , , Message-ID: On Wednesday, March 10, 2010 at 9:28, dwight elvey wrote: > I don't have a 12821, it is a 59310. It should work for most any HP-IB > thought. One difference is that the 59310 is about 1/2 as fast: 470 KB/sec with standard memory and 570 KB/sec with high-performance memory. The 12821 is buffered, so DCPC can steal every I/O cycle vs. every other I/O cycle for the 59310. Speed is 937 KB/sec. (Source: HP 1000/9000 Interface Products Specification Guide, 5954-6312, August 1985.) I suspect that if an unbuffered drive is used with the 59310, overrun errors would occur. If they didn't, performance may be terrible, as you might incur a one-rotation latency for each sector, unless the drive format was interleaved. The 12821 was the interface supported for hard drive connections under RTE; the 59310 was positioned as an instrumentation controller. -- Dave From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 11 22:02:58 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 22:02:58 -0600 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <894261E9-105B-48DB-BF33-A32BEDC304C3@bellsouth.net> References: <201003112232.o2BMWaDt013532@floodgap.com> <894261E9-105B-48DB-BF33-A32BEDC304C3@bellsouth.net> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003112002l76004c4fw8d40e091296e1944@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 4:37 PM, Geoff Oltmans wrote: > One thing to note about fructose as well.. it's in all fruit. Not exactly > evil. > With fruit, you get all the other things associated with fruit. But even fruit juice isn't really natural. The sugar is just so concentrated. You're much better off eating an orange than drinking a glass of orange juice. And high fructose corn syrup is franken-food. brian From brain at jbrain.com Thu Mar 11 22:30:04 2010 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 22:30:04 -0600 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B99C34C.1030207@jbrain.com> On 3/11/2010 2:52 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > I suspect the same is true of hardware. If you provide it > as a kit, particulalry as a kit with SMD components, you will not get > total idiots buying it. And for something like this where the user has to > have some clue to use it, that is almost certainly a Good Thing. > I wish this were true, but sadly, I have not found it to be a fact. In fact, I'm shying away from kits now, due to the experiences I have had: * Through hole kits to make it easier for the hobbyist tends to require more PCB space, which drives up the cost a bit (not a major issue, but something to consider). Obviously, an SMT kit would not suffer from this issue * If you offer kits and complete units, people see the cost difference, and they decide "they can do it". Then, they get it down, it does not work, and then they take up lots of time asking questions or trying to debug over email. * Most people decide it's not worth the effort to solder, so they just pay the extra anyway. Jim From ggs at shiresoft.com Thu Mar 11 23:48:16 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 21:48:16 -0800 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> <15A71C2B-08F9-43F5-9264-5A582599F1E1@shiresoft.com> Message-ID: <5BD462DB-27C3-4821-9718-A8447CC9127B@shiresoft.com> On Mar 11, 2010, at 8:48 AM, Steve Maddison wrote: > Guy Sotomayor wrote: >> I've looked at those for a while, but haven't found anyone who actually >> stocks them. A number of places have them in their catalogs but have a 28 >> week lead time. Where did you find them? > > I got mine from Mouser just a week or two ago. Yea, just checked this morning and they have only a few thru-hole parts and SOICs are on 28 week backorder (which means that no one has any and TI has to schedule fab time to make more). > >> Ideally the part that I want is similar to the 26s10 but it's non-bus >> side signals are tri-state and LVTTL compliant. That would save me a fair >> number of parts. > > Planning to drive and receive from a single pin, per chance? If > they'll take LVTTL on the driver input (which I'm hoping they will) > you could probably get away with one 5V-tolerant tri-state buffer on > the receiver output if the enables are used wisely. I was planning to > try such a set-up with a 74LVC244. That would work as it's spec'd to drive 5v with 5v tolerant inputs using a 3.3v supply. It (and some related parts) support power sequencing if you tie the enable (through a pullup to 3.3v) it'll be disabled while the 3.3v (and possibly others) is coming up. TTFN - Guy From ggs at shiresoft.com Fri Mar 12 00:01:24 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 22:01:24 -0800 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <9191B5AD-797A-47A0-BB3A-DCBEA0F8DEEF@neurotica.com> References: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <0C54E543-A0BE-4362-A496-E0D904BA5F8B@neurotica.com> <4B985BDA.2050308@e-bbes.com> <4B986901.9060108@e-bbes.com> <4B986DE8.8040308@jbrain.com> <0ADE4712-451A-451B-A57B-3DC31CDAEBDC@shiresoft.com> <9191B5AD-797A-47A0-BB3A-DCBEA0F8DEEF@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Mar 11, 2010, at 9:28 AM, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 11, 2010, at 11:19 AM, Guy Sotomayor wrote: >> Passives are not an issue. The assembly house supplies them as part of the assembly fee. > > Ahh, an assembly house...another expense. I build my own boards...far cheaper. But then I've not dealt with big enough quantities for that to become a problem; the largest run I've done was fifty units. For me it's not a matter of expense, it's getting it done. I'm not good enough any more to solder these parts with the fine pin pitch and forget about trying to do BGAs outside of an assembly house (or with sophisticated BGA rework stations with re-ballers). > >> Even if they didn't, I'd pay them for it - I don't want to deal with parts that I have a hard time seeing much less handling. FPGAs, level shifters (or more appropriately 5v tolerant LVTTL transceivers), LVDO regulators, etc. cost $$s no matter who you buy from (and I order from a lot of different suppliers). I also design using readily available (ie in production) parts (the only exception are the unibus transceivers and I go on the secondary market for those and typically can only buy in lots of what's available...ie if somebody has 350 parts for $7/ea, that's what I get...yes I have a lot of $'s tied up in various inventory). > > Yes, I have that problem too. :-( They sure do come in handy, though. > > Speaking of those 5V-tolerant transceivers, what's your favorite part these days? For "drivers": SN74LVC244 (2x4), SN74LVC541 (1x8) and SN74LVC162244 (4x4) or for the truely insane SN74LVCH322244 (8x4) but the last is BGA only. For fully registered transceivers: SN74LVCH16543 (2x8). I sometimes use the registered transceivers on outputs from the FPGA to keep the simultaneous output signal switching in spec (ie stagger the switching of the output signals by a clock cycle and then once all of the outputs are stable, clock it into the registered transceiver). TTFN - Guy From bqt at softjar.se Thu Mar 11 07:47:55 2010 From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:47:55 +0100 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B98F48B.60500@softjar.se> "Zane H. Healy" wrote: > On Wed, 10 Mar 2010, e.stiebler wrote: > >> > Zane H. Healy wrote: >> > >>>> >>> OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not that >>>> >>> expensive. >>> >> >>> >> What "old ones" show up on eBay? >> > >> > The "usual" suspects like cmd, dilog, emulex ? >> > OK, in all honesty I didn't check for more than a year, but they showed up >> > before, that's why I canceled my design ... > > Okay, old 3rd party disk controllers. The problem with these is that they > also require old hard drives. I'm also slightly surprised to hear mention > of CMD controllers that aren't expensive, but then I've not looked for such > things in years. Huh? New SCSI disks works just as well. The biggest problem might be that some OSes gets confused by really big disks. With RSX for instance, the device driver used to have a bug so that disks larger than 8 Gig didn't work right. The size got masked to 24 bits... With M+ 4.6, the system instead caps the disk size at 8 Gig if the disk is larger, unless you switch to 32 bit LBNs. The only other problem with SCSI disks is that you might need to get adapters for the old style 50 pin connectors. However, as long as we talk plain SCSI, and not differential, or something else odd, it is still just fine being backward compatible... > My PDP-11's are using 1" High 3.5" SCSI Hard Drives, it does wonders for the > noise level, and helps with the power consumption, but I'm honestly a bit > worried about their long term viability. At least I have a much larger > supply of SCSI drives I can use than I do MFM Hard Drives (and yes, I have a > few of those, and a couple ESDI drives). I'm using second, or if it is third generation storage work disks for my machines. Blue boxes. Pretty. And I can put seven of them in one unit. Actually, I only have five in there, along with a DAT-3 tape unit, and an Exabyte externally. > Of course the other thing I worry about is power supplies. In fact that's > what I've been loosing VMS boxes to. :-( Power supplies for the PDP-11s? Yes, that is always a possible problem... And a bigger one than disks, I'd say. Johnny From bqt at softjar.se Thu Mar 11 07:57:18 2010 From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist) Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:57:18 +0100 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B98F6BE.7030804@softjar.se> "e.stiebler" wrote: > Dave McGuire wrote: >>> >> OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not that >>> >> expensive. >> > Not that expensive? I call $100-200 for a Qbus card pretty pricey. >> > Unibus models go for many hundreds, upwards of $1000. > > Sorry, but the new one want be cheaper than that. That's why I don't > call them expensive. Indeed. If we talk $200 just for the board, and then you still have do develop the firmware, then $200 for a actual, already tested and proven SCSI controller is cheap. And new SCSI disks can still be bought as well. And while not dirt cheap perhaps, they are still not that expensive. Especially since you are not interested in several hundred gig drives for a PDP-11 anyway. Someone else asked about differences between a RQDX1 and RQDX3, from a software point of view. There is none, except in the irrelevant parts, such as the identity given by the controller, and version numbers and so on. The controllers are both MSCP. In fact, they are no different (either of them) from a KDA50, or UDA50 for that matter. Or any other MSCP controller. That's the whole point of MSCP. The controller always present the same interface to the computer. What it does on the other side is hidden. So, in fact, the device driver is the same for all these controllers, in all operating systems. MSCP is a great concept. Just wish it had survived. But, as with many DEC designs - they were technically wonderful, but they weren't PC. And PC became the de facto standard. No matter how lousy the hardware was/is. Johnny From steerex at ccvn.com Fri Mar 12 04:36:39 2010 From: steerex at ccvn.com (Steve Robertson) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 05:36:39 -0500 Subject: Wirewrap boards update References: <4B9765A2.2017.4EDF39@cclist.sydex.com>, <002001cac0fd$e2b28690$0301a8c0@win2k> <4B98BC00.11786.600DE7@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <003001cac1cf$e6353c40$0301a8c0@win2k> > > > I generally use a hand-wrapping tool to unwind the wires. I really > > don't know of an easier way to unwind them. It's tedious work but, if > > you're doing small projects like I was, you can do a small area and > > then cut that section from the bigger board. > > I do my boards a bit differently. I use single-sided FR4 PCB, > usually 0.060" thick and drill holes for the pins and punch them in > (slighly countersinking the foil side). It's only a little more work > than using the gridded-out-lots-of-pins protoboards, but more than > makes up for it in that components are easy to identify (no "forest > of pins" effect) and presents a ground plane that's second to none. > > --Chuck > Hmmm... Good Idea! Let's see... If you took a proto-board that was already drilled on a .1" X .1" grid and placed it over the blank board, you could use it as a guide for the fresh holes. Then the new holes would align up exactly on the grid. If I ever start wirewrapping again, I'll give that a try. Or... If you used a blank board with no copper, you wouldn't need to contersink the holes. Of course, you loose the benefits of the ground plane but, for the stuff I'm doing, that really isn't an issue. I recently figured out how easy it is to make PCBs at home so, now I'm making boards as I need them. I'm still new at it but, have been able to make some pretty decent looking boards. Last week I figured out how to make a very simple "drill press" like contraption for drilling boards. It works great! No more broken bits, no more holes offset from the pads, and it was free. My current project is a 3 axis PCB drilling machine. I'm making good progress but, since I don't have a machine shop or a large stash of money, the mechanical components are not easy to do. Hope we're not getting too far off topic. SteveRob From jfoust at threedee.com Fri Mar 12 06:27:25 2010 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 06:27:25 -0600 Subject: Drive recovery Message-ID: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET> Just my luck! I'm making the final backup copy of my old Mac G3, and one of the drives dies, and my other backup wasn't. I take it apart - it's a 20 gig IBM Deskstar DTLA-305020, just old enough for the (cough) ten-year-rule, and well-known prone to two modes of failure, click of death and NVRAM failure. I'm hearing the NVRAM failure sound as shown at: http://www.dataclinic.co.uk/ibm-deskstar-hard-disk-drive-data-loss.htm In googling, I saw one reference to someone replacing the 8-pin NVRAM themselves from a donor drive, but that seems risky to me. I think I'll send it to Gillware.com, a Madison, WI-based recovery place. They offer $400-700 Windows recovery but charge a premium for Mac recovery ($700-$1000) and Linux ($800-1000), with the higher price for "clean room recovery". (Hmm, I thought bits were bits.) Any other advice - besides a better backup strategy? - John From ragooman at comcast.net Fri Mar 12 07:00:06 2010 From: ragooman at comcast.net (Dan Roganti) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 08:00:06 -0500 Subject: Drive recovery In-Reply-To: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <4B9A3AD6.6050105@comcast.net> John Foust wrote: > Just my luck! I'm making the final backup copy of my old Mac G3, > and one of the drives dies, and my other backup wasn't. > > I take it apart - it's a 20 gig IBM Deskstar DTLA-305020, just > old enough for the (cough) ten-year-rule, and well-known prone to > two modes of failure, click of death and NVRAM failure. I'm hearing > the NVRAM failure sound as shown at: > > http://www.dataclinic.co.uk/ibm-deskstar-hard-disk-drive-data-loss.htm > > In googling, I saw one reference to someone replacing the 8-pin NVRAM > themselves from a donor drive, but that seems risky to me. > > I think I'll send it to Gillware.com, a Madison, WI-based recovery > place. They offer $400-700 Windows recovery but charge a premium > for Mac recovery ($700-$1000) and Linux ($800-1000), with the higher > price for "clean room recovery". (Hmm, I thought bits were bits.) > Any other advice - besides a better backup strategy? > I found this place to be very reliable, no fuss, no hype, very professional, and it doesn't matter what OS was being used. http://datacent.com/ And they have a comprehensive list of info on the many drives and their common problems, don't get disappointed in their review of the concerns they have for the quality of your drive. It's a good reality check when you read about all the defects that occur--even with the modern drives they make today. I had a brand new WD 500GB crash after only 11 mon. So now I use dual 1TB drives to backup everything. http://datacent.com/datarecovery/hdd/ibm/DTLA-305020 =Dan http://www.vintagecomputer.net/ragooman/ From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Mar 12 07:54:24 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 07:54:24 -0600 Subject: Drive recovery In-Reply-To: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <4B9A4790.8040008@gmail.com> John Foust wrote: > I think I'll send it to Gillware.com, a Madison, WI-based recovery > place. They offer $400-700 Windows recovery but charge a premium > for Mac recovery ($700-$1000) and Linux ($800-1000), with the higher > price for "clean room recovery". (Hmm, I thought bits were bits.) > Any other advice - besides a better backup strategy? I'm curious about that - presumably the cost differences encompass them stitching partial data back together from the different filesystems and getting you as much of your data back as possible in the case where the actual disk surfaces are hosed. Whether the cost reflects the complexity of the different filesystems or just the abilities of the staff there ("we charge more for Linux because we only have one guy who knows how to do that"), I don't know. In your case, it sounds like the data *might* be fine - in which case they'll be making a few hundred bucks out of you just because you don't happen to have a Windows system , and all they'll do is swap the NVRAM on your drive and drag the contents off. cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Mar 12 07:59:58 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 07:59:58 -0600 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <34FE18C6-3F91-48CE-8749-012F25C73446@neurotica.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <4B9967E1.4080809@verizon.net> <34FE18C6-3F91-48CE-8749-012F25C73446@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4B9A48DE.2010501@gmail.com> Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 11, 2010, at 5:00 PM, Keith wrote: >>>> I can believe it. My wife called back. We're paying 12c a kw/h. I >>>> guess >>>> my math wasn't so far off. >>> Wow, that's pretty high! Where are you? >>> -Dave >> >> http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/table5_6_a.html >> (from Nov 2009) >> >> I pay about $0.12 here too. How's this high? US average is $0.1133 ? >> >> Hawaii pays $0.26. Now that's high. :) > > High compared to me, at about $0.09/kWh. Yeah, that's what ours it too, although all the stuff on off-peak comes in at $0.04/kWh (but I'm restricted in what devices I can hook up to that - unless I could get the electric company to classify a mainframe as a resistive space heater ;-) cheers Jules From dgahling at hotmail.com Fri Mar 12 08:46:12 2010 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 09:46:12 -0500 Subject: Drive recovery In-Reply-To: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: If the drive actually runs and is detectable, I'd suggest running RTT (RType) on it. it's very inexpensive, and will recover a host of data from different formats. I haven't had a drive it couldn't recover from, even my USB flash disk, it got the data back, even though the system said it was unformatted. but the drive has to actually at least run and seen in bios. I don't recommend spinrite, until at least after you've gotten the data off it. Dan. > Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 06:27:25 -0600 > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > From: jfoust at threedee.com > Subject: Drive recovery > > > Just my luck! I'm making the final backup copy of my old Mac G3, > and one of the drives dies, and my other backup wasn't. > > I take it apart - it's a 20 gig IBM Deskstar DTLA-305020, just > old enough for the (cough) ten-year-rule, and well-known prone to > two modes of failure, click of death and NVRAM failure. I'm hearing > the NVRAM failure sound as shown at: > > http://www.dataclinic.co.uk/ibm-deskstar-hard-disk-drive-data-loss.htm > > In googling, I saw one reference to someone replacing the 8-pin NVRAM > themselves from a donor drive, but that seems risky to me. > > I think I'll send it to Gillware.com, a Madison, WI-based recovery > place. They offer $400-700 Windows recovery but charge a premium > for Mac recovery ($700-$1000) and Linux ($800-1000), with the higher > price for "clean room recovery". (Hmm, I thought bits were bits.) > Any other advice - besides a better backup strategy? > > - John > _________________________________________________________________ Stay in touch. http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9712959 From spectre at floodgap.com Fri Mar 12 08:58:42 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 06:58:42 -0800 (PST) Subject: Drive recovery In-Reply-To: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET> from John Foust at "Mar 12, 10 06:27:25 am" Message-ID: <201003121458.o2CEwgpR015466@floodgap.com> > I think I'll send it to Gillware.com, a Madison, WI-based recovery > place. They offer $400-700 Windows recovery but charge a premium > for Mac recovery ($700-$1000) and Linux ($800-1000), with the higher > price for "clean room recovery". (Hmm, I thought bits were bits.) > Any other advice - besides a better backup strategy? I can make a personal referral to DriveRescue, owned by my friend Drew Janssen, who specializes primarily in Mac recovery. If you mention the prices offered to you and the situation, he might be able to make you a better offer (no promises). Tell him I sent you. http://www.driverescue.net/recovery.html -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Silly is a state of mind, stupid is a way of life. -- Dave Butler ---------- From spedraja at ono.com Fri Mar 12 09:35:54 2010 From: spedraja at ono.com (SPC) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 16:35:54 +0100 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <3038151217618386141@unknownmsgid> References: <3038151217618386141@unknownmsgid> Message-ID: I would be interested. I got one PDP-11/23 PLUS. If someone develops it for one PDP8E I got one too. Regards Sergio 2010/3/10 Rob Jarratt > There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which ended up > with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to build an > FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD interface on > the other which anyone could then program to emulate any disk/controller > they like. I have been in touch with him to see how much interest he has > had, because he needs a minimum number of about 10 to make it viable, but > so > far there has only been me and one other person showing an interest. David > reckons they would come to a little over $200 each (possibly less if there > is more interest). David is not yet on cctalk so he agreed to let me > cross-post this to cctalk on his behalf, but I have cc'd him so you can > reply direct. > > Regards > > Rob > From joachim.thiemann at gmail.com Fri Mar 12 10:18:42 2010 From: joachim.thiemann at gmail.com (Joachim Thiemann) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 11:18:42 -0500 Subject: SD card on the "obvious" classic bus Message-ID: <4affc5e1003120818l252ddbb6ka6461638c03d2848@mail.gmail.com> Hello, with all this talk about SD card for QBUS machines, I was wondering: SD (and SDHC) is easy to interface (if you're not too concerned about speed) and has been attached to pretty much everything under the sun; (well, I guess Jim is still working on the C= version of IEEE-488) so is there anyone making an SD card drive for SCSI? To me that would be a very versatile classic interface; I'd love to have a dead-silent drive for my Amiga, Macs and Sparcs. ST owners would like it too, I'm sure. I know there is one company making SCSI-to-CF interfaces, aimed primarily at old synthesizers (http://www.scsiforsamplers.com/). Unfortunately, the online "search space" is somewhat poisoned due to the fact that most Linux/BSD/whatever OS's use a SCSI emulation to access SD cards - but eyeballing several pages of results I didn't find any SD-to-SCSI devices. I certainly don't have the technical chops to make something like that myself from scratch - but I'd guess a low-speed hack to do it could be accomplished with a Atmel or similar chip with at least 21 IO pins (16 for the SCSI side, 5 for the SD card) but I don't know what kind of line drivers would be needed on the SCSI side. Is anyone aware of such a project in the works? Joe. -- Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem From dkelvey at hotmail.com Fri Mar 12 11:14:12 2010 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 09:14:12 -0800 Subject: Anyone running RTE-M on an HP 21MX series M, E, or F? In-Reply-To: References: , , , , , Message-ID: > From: jdbryan at acm.org > > On Wednesday, March 10, 2010 at 9:28, dwight elvey wrote: > > > I don't have a 12821, it is a 59310. It should work for most any HP-IB > > thought. > > One difference is that the 59310 is about 1/2 as fast: 470 KB/sec with > standard memory and 570 KB/sec with high-performance memory. The 12821 is > buffered, so DCPC can steal every I/O cycle vs. every other I/O cycle for > the 59310. Speed is 937 KB/sec. (Source: HP 1000/9000 Interface Products > Specification Guide, 5954-6312, August 1985.) > > I suspect that if an unbuffered drive is used with the 59310, overrun > errors would occur. If they didn't, performance may be terrible, as you > might incur a one-rotation latency for each sector, unless the drive format > was interleaved. > > The 12821 was the interface supported for hard drive connections under RTE; > the 59310 was positioned as an instrumentation controller. > > -- Dave > Hi Dave This is good info. I was thinking of using it intially with a GPIB board in my PC. Speed would be no issue here since it will self throttle. I was hoping to get it running with one of the newer 9000 series drives. I hope these are buffered. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail is redefining busy with tools for the New Busy. Get more from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_2 From brad at heeltoe.com Fri Mar 12 11:22:32 2010 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 12:22:32 -0500 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4B99458B.6000409@philpem.me.uk> (sfid-20100311_145056_600573_5F1B2CDD) References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> <4B99458B.6000409@philpem.me.uk> (sfid-20100311_145056_600573_5F1B2CDD) Message-ID: On Mar 11, 2010, at 2:33 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote: > >> And this is my current frustration! Verilog. FPGAs. Etc. > > Verilog isn't that hard to learn, it's all the other stuff that goes along with it (metastability, clock synchronisation, clock domains, finite-state machine implementation, ...) It's a good point. If you want to make reliable designs you need to learn and understand all those things very well. But if you need hands on first, I might recommend finding an old copy of "multisim". You can sometimes find them on ebay. It's a really fun mixed mode simulator which will allow you to play with logic and see the results. It's completely graphical and has a lot of good examples. I often use it to breadboard analog designs before I solder - saves me a lot of time. If you want to do real synchronous design, which most of these fpga or even cpld designs should be, you need to learn some fundamentals. As painful as it might be, I'd try and find one of the entry level EE logic design courses, either on the web or via a book. Do the exercises and learn the concepts - they will help you later. And, if you manage to find multisim, you can have a lot more fun doing your homework :-) If you get a copy of "gtkwave" and "cver", you can spend a lot of time having fun making state machines and simple cpu's. But you really need to learn proper state machine design if you want your designs to work in real hardware... I've done full up co-simulation with cver, gtkwave and simh (plus some glue software). check out "Verilog Digital Computer Design: Algorithms Into Hardware". It has a lot of examples you could type in and get to work quickly. "Verilog quickstart" is also good, but it assumes you already know digital design. In the end, verilog is just the tool. You'll need to understand good digital design viscerally but once you do you can use any HDL - they're all the same in the end. -brad Brad Parker Heeltoe Consulting 781-483-3101 http://www.heeltoe.com From mcguire at neurotica.com Fri Mar 12 11:37:30 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 12:37:30 -0500 Subject: calculating electricity costs In-Reply-To: <4B9A48DE.2010501@gmail.com> References: <6dbe3c381003110832j26de2435y30a6f6d50893163c@mail.gmail.com> <201003111705.o2BH59p0061957@billY.EZWIND.NET> <6dbe3c381003110928g4ca13cbm6ef206cedc10ee70@mail.gmail.com> <4B9967E1.4080809@verizon.net> <34FE18C6-3F91-48CE-8749-012F25C73446@neurotica.com> <4B9A48DE.2010501@gmail.com> Message-ID: <8C7BE9B2-48D0-4F55-882E-410D914FDFBB@neurotica.com> On Mar 12, 2010, at 8:59 AM, Jules Richardson wrote: >>>>> I can believe it. My wife called back. We're paying 12c a kw/ >>>>> h. I guess >>>>> my math wasn't so far off. >>>> Wow, that's pretty high! Where are you? >>>> -Dave >>> >>> http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/table5_6_a.html >>> (from Nov 2009) >>> >>> I pay about $0.12 here too. How's this high? US average is >>> $0.1133 ? >>> >>> Hawaii pays $0.26. Now that's high. :) >> High compared to me, at about $0.09/kWh. > > Yeah, that's what ours it too, although all the stuff on off-peak > comes in at $0.04/kWh (but I'm restricted in what devices I can > hook up to that - unless I could get the electric company to > classify a mainframe as a resistive space heater ;-) Possibly an "irresistible space heater". ;) So I assume they want loads at a power factor of 1 to get the better rate? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Fri Mar 12 12:07:22 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 18:07:22 +0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9A82DA.3080506@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: > Absolutely. Strippd, it's good for soldering along broken tracks (yes, I > know the really relaible way is to solder to the nearest component lead > on the track, but for a lot of things, scraping off the solder mask and > soldering a wire along the track is good enough. A blob of solder over > the crack most certainly isn't!). At one point, I had a copy of the NASA standards for PCB modifications, which covered green-wire fixes. I think it's online somewhere... Anyway, for SMD parts (SOICs etc.) you're supposed to run a piece of wire along the pin, then solder it to the pin. The icing on the cake is that you're supposed to solder along the entire length of the pin, not just the land pad. I would LOVE to see someone do that with a 0.5mm-pitch QFP. Soldering to the track is not only easier, but more likely to succeed... I found one roll of the stuff (30AWG w/w wire) on my "big shelf o' miscellaneous wire" last night. It's green, made by "OK", on a 500ft reel. Ideal for greenwire fixes in the literal sense :) Also found a roll of RG58/U, and another roll of RG174. More stuff I didn't know I had. > That's what I thought too. But when I wanted that 38swg enamelled copper > wire to rewind the motors I mentioend, Maplin were the only place that > stocked it. RS and Farnell don't (as far as I can see). I popped into a > Maplin in London and they had a 250g reel of it on the shelf. I was > amazed. Enamelled copper wire is a pig to find in general. You are right though, Maplin are usually one of the only places that stock it. What annoys me is the scrapping of the in-store-order scheme. Basically, if the store was out of stock of something, you could place a back-order, and when it arrived (they sent it direct to the store in the weekly stock replenishment) you could go and pick it up. Worked pretty well for me. > Unfortunately that darn EMC directive killed off the Maplin kits (they > would have had to be checked for compliance when assembled according to > the instructions). Maplin still sell a few Vellemann kits, and another > brand that I can't rememebr. At the time the kits were discontinued, Maplin were basically in a bit of a "hobby electronics is dead" blast. They sold the rights to their electronics magazine to Kanda (IIRC), the kits went the way of the dodo, and the component selection got severely trimmed to make way for more "Innovations-catalogue tat" (as one of my friends so eloquently put it). It's a shame about the magazine, though -- they published some pretty neat projects, all of which could be built from parts available from Maplins (with the occasional special-order), and the articles usually did a pretty good job of explaining not just how the thing worked, but also why it was designed in that specific way. EPE have gone down the road of buying in articles from Silicon Chip, and ETI went bust (or were absorbed into EPE depending on how you look at it), which really just leaves Elektor and Circuit Cellar. Both of which seem to be pitching themselves more at the "experienced engineer" market than home hobbyists. Actually, speaking of Circuit Cellar, I seem to recall Elektor buying them out... $DEITY knows what's going to happen to my CC sub, but I did notice that the renewal cost for an online subscription has gone up a fair bit since they took over. Hmm. It should be noted that it's still a quarter of the cost of an Elektor Online sub (and an eighth the cost of a year of Elektor in dead-tree format). I'm actually in the process of replacing a lot of my paper magazines with PDFs -- it's just easier (not to mention quicker) to find things when I need them... Dave Tweed's Circuit Cellar index is immense (and it's a CSV file so easy to pull into MySQL) > I can remember, perhaps 20 years ago, going to the Maplin shop in Bristol > and comping home with a couple of bags of ICs, conenctors, cable, etc for > whatever I was building at the time. Alas not any more :-( You can still do more or less the same thing in Leeds, though not with Maplin. The Farnell Trade Counter is based in Armley, and fairly easy to get to by public transport (there's a bus stop on the opposite side of the road). Ring ahead, give them an hour or two to pack everything up, then call in and collect. Though that said, even standard "over the phone" sales orders tend to arrive next-day if you order before about 4PM. I don't think it's actually guaranteed, but there's no delivery fee and IIRC the only restriction is that you have to order ?30 worth of stuff if you're paying by card, or ?5 if you're paying by cash at the trade counter. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From jfoust at threedee.com Fri Mar 12 12:16:26 2010 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 12:16:26 -0600 Subject: Drive recovery In-Reply-To: References: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <201003121816.o2CIGfrU043175@billY.EZWIND.NET> At 08:46 AM 3/12/2010, Dan Gahlinger wrote: >If the drive actually runs and is detectable, >I'd suggest running RTT (RType) on it. You mean http://www.r-tt.com/ 's R-Studio. Yes, I have that. Works great when the drive is still capable of getting to some or all of the data. Mine is clearly not. - John From onymouse at garlic.com Fri Mar 12 12:11:35 2010 From: onymouse at garlic.com (jd) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 10:11:35 -0800 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003112002l76004c4fw8d40e091296e1944@mail.gmail.com> References: <201003112232.o2BMWaDt013532@floodgap.com> <894261E9-105B-48DB-BF33-A32BEDC304C3@bellsouth.net> <6dbe3c381003112002l76004c4fw8d40e091296e1944@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B9A83D7.7080809@garlic.com> Coffee with sugar: Only a couple cups of my evil brew or as much as a quart of a 7-11's or McD's over several hours. Red Bull occasionally, if I need a bit more stimulation. There's always some degree of crash with caffiene so if I have something to do I have to do it quick. Can't code or hack or analyse on the crash. A cuppa of PG Tips or such with sugar or honey every couple of hours or so if I don't need a major caffeine rush for the day. It's preferred when I don't want to be interrupted by anything, epsecially restroom breaks. Bladders full of caffeine tend to derail trains of thought and and tear up track as well. If it's a cola with sugar, it seems better than a cola with HFCS, which generally makes me feel rotten. A sugar soda makes me feel better and doesn't make me eventually feel worse than before, like HFCS sodas. I rarely drink soda and I definitely prefer the ones with sugar, which definitely has a different and much better taste than HFCS, BTW. I tend to stick with brands that exclusively use sugar, like Jones. I quit drinking diet sodas containing that alleged sweetener approved by the remnants of the Carter FDA in 1980 after I noticed (after a bout of flu) that I stunk of formaldehyde. And since then my brain has recovered somewhat. I couldn't help but notice that a marked increase in diabetes and other digestive and liver problems seemed to correlate to the increasing use and consumption of sweeteners other than sugar and saccharins. It must be simple coincidence. Of course. Right? == jd "Cutting the space budget really restores my faith in humanity. It eliminates dreams, goals, and ideals and lets us get straight to the business of hate, debauchery, and self-annihilation." -- Johnny Hart -- From onymouse at garlic.com Fri Mar 12 13:13:33 2010 From: onymouse at garlic.com (jd) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 11:13:33 -0800 Subject: Drive recovery In-Reply-To: <201003121458.o2CEwgpR015466@floodgap.com> References: <201003121458.o2CEwgpR015466@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <4B9A925D.5050405@garlic.com> It would be nice for me to find a place that didn't charge at least a month's pay to copy a disk image to a new drive like DriveSavers would. AFIAK, just the motor driver gave up the smoke when plugged into a new and somehow unregulated power supply. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 12 14:14:27 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 20:14:27 +0000 (GMT) Subject: rare and not-so rare systems available In-Reply-To: <624966d61003111630w4d2d659bne81f4c4d76df8813@mail.gmail.com> from "Paul Anderson" at Mar 11, 10 06:30:52 pm Message-ID: > > Hi Tony, > > Interested in trading the zeiss microscope for something else? Not yet. I also like fine instruments, and a microscope is quite useful for looking at small bits of machinery/electronics. OK, this one is overkill, but as I said I like nice instruments.. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 12 14:40:53 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 20:40:53 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B9A82DA.3080506@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 12, 10 06:07:22 pm Message-ID: > > At one point, I had a copy of the NASA standards for PCB modifications,=20 > which covered green-wire fixes. I think it's online somewhere... Anyway,=20 > for SMD parts (SOICs etc.) you're supposed to run a piece of wire along=20 > the pin, then solder it to the pin. The icing on the cake is that you're=20 > supposed to solder along the entire length of the pin, not just the land=20 > pad. I wonder how necessary that is. The only time I've ever had problems just soldering to the track was on a very poor quality SRBP board where the tracks would lift if you looked at them wrong. Of course my application is not as critical as NASA's ;-) > > I would LOVE to see someone do that with a 0.5mm-pitch QFP. Soldering to=20 > the track is not only easier, but more likely to succeed... :-) > > I found one roll of the stuff (30AWG w/w wire) on my "big shelf o'=20 > miscellaneous wire" last night. It's green, made by "OK", on a 500ft=20 > reel. Ideal for greenwire fixes in the literal sense :) > > Also found a roll of RG58/U, and another roll of RG174. More stuff I=20 > didn't know I had. Tell me about it. I went lookinf for the RS232 board for a plotter I am restoring. I found it (inm the 5th box of boards I looked in). I also found half a dozzen sets of RK05 boards, a coup[le of Torch XXX boards, a Qbus SCSI card (!), more HP stuff, and so on. All of which I'd forgotten about. > Enamelled copper wire is a pig to find in general. You are right though,=20 > Maplin are usually one of the only places that stock it. It's certainly difficult to get in small-ish qunatities. > What annoys me is the scrapping of the in-store-order scheme. Basically,=20 > if the store was out of stock of something, you could place a=20 > back-order, and when it arrived (they sent it direct to the store in the=20 > weekly stock replenishment) you could go and pick it up. Worked pretty=20 > well for me. At one time, if you want to the shop and they were out of stock, you could have it delieverd to any shop _or youe homw_ free of charge. Even if it was just 1 resistor. Not any more. > It's a shame about the magazine, though -- they published some pretty=20 > neat projects, all of which could be built from parts available from=20 Indeed. I built many of them over the years. I rememebr watching commetical for NICAM televisions using the Maplin NICAM tuner/decoder kit and a greenscreen monitor :-). I still have both of the Dragon add-on boards (modified slightly for the CoCo and to put them at more sensible places in the address map). And so on. I wish for historical reasons I'd built a Maplin Modem.... I still have a couple of the bare PCBs in the pile... > Maplins (with the occasional special-order), and the articles usually=20 > did a pretty good job of explaining not just how the thing worked, but=20 > also why it was designed in that specific way. I also have a virstually complete set of the magazines... > > EPE have gone down the road of buying in articles from Silicon Chip, and=20 > ETI went bust (or were absorbed into EPE depending on how you look at=20 > it), which really just leaves Elektor and Circuit Cellar. Both of which=20 > seem to be pitching themselves more at the "experienced engineer" market=20 > than home hobbyists. I gave up Circuit Cellar and then Elektor when they both became 'yet another microcontroller project' magazines. As you well know, I have nothing against microcontrollers, but I don't think they're the _only_ solution. And Elektor seemed to think that 'computer' == Wintel box with USB which rather put me off. > > I'm actually in the process of replacing a lot of my paper magazines=20 > with PDFs -- it's just easier (not to mention quicker) to find things=20 On the other hand it's easier to flup through magaziens, and it's easier to read them in bed. And they can be used on the workbench... > when I need them... Dave Tweed's Circuit Cellar index is immense (and=20 > it's a CSV file so easy to pull into MySQL) > > > I can remember, perhaps 20 years ago, going to the Maplin shop in Brist= > ol=20 > > and comping home with a couple of bags of ICs, conenctors, cable, etc f= > or=20 > > whatever I was building at the time. Alas not any more :-( > > You can still do more or less the same thing in Leeds, though not with=20 > Maplin. The Farnell Trade Counter is based in Armley, and fairly easy to=20 I wish there was something similar in the London area... > get to by public transport (there's a bus stop on the opposite side of=20 > the road). Ring ahead, give them an hour or two to pack everything up,=20 > then call in and collect. > > Though that said, even standard "over the phone" sales orders tend to=20 > arrive next-day if you order before about 4PM. I don't think it's=20 > actually guaranteed, but there's no delivery fee and IIRC the only=20 > restriction is that you have to order =A330 worth of stuff if you're=20 > paying by card, or =A35 if you're paying by cash at the trade counter. AFAIK, unless you have a trade account you have to order on the web. This is not a problem, of course (and it means you can, in theory, check the stock levels before you place the order -- 'in theory' becuase they're not always accurate). And it noramlly comes next day, even if it has to be sent from Belgium The problem is that 25 quid minimum order. Not that I can't find that ammount of stuff I can use at Farnell, but that I can't afford to make up that size order every time I need a couple of resistors. That's where Maplin were handy. If I needed a few passives or common ICs I coulld pop in, get them, and pay a little bit of cash. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 12 14:17:47 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 20:17:47 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02t In-Reply-To: from "Zane H. Healy" at Mar 11, 10 07:13:08 pm Message-ID: > > At 6:59 PM +0000 3/11/10, Tony Duell wrote: > > > Of course the other thing I worry about is power supplies. In fact that's > >> what I've been loosing VMS boxes to. :-( > > > >Normally DEC PSUs are well behaved in that when they fail they don't do > >any damage to the rest of the machine. Given that, and given that there > >are unliklely to be any custom ICs in the PSU, what is the problem? > > Face it Tony, we're not all wizards like you. :-( Though given the I am not a wizard. In fact I doubt if I am even a hacker. I've always take n the attitude, though (as I mentioned in another thread) that id I need to do something (as here, fix a PSU) and I odn't know how to do it, then I am going to teach myself how to do it. > necessary parts, I could fix the one in my VAXstation 4000/vlc > (fans). The PSU in the XP1000 and the way that machine is acting has Another difference between you and me. I _repair_ fans. No, I am not kidding. > me more than a little concerned, I'm afraid it might have taken > something with it. I discovered the problem on Monday, and haven't > had time to take a serious look at it. Though as long as the CPU > board, and the SCSI boards in it are fine, I should be okay. My > other XP1000 is only a 500Mhz, so I'd prefer not to loose the 667Mhz > CPU. What's it doing? Could it be excessive ripple or noise on a power line? -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 12 14:22:30 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 20:22:30 +0000 (GMT) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: <4B99C34C.1030207@jbrain.com> from "Jim Brain" at Mar 11, 10 10:30:04 pm Message-ID: > > On 3/11/2010 2:52 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > > I suspect the same is true of hardware. If you provide it > > as a kit, particulalry as a kit with SMD components, you will not get > > total idiots buying it. And for something like this where the user has to > > have some clue to use it, that is almost certainly a Good Thing. > > > I wish this were true, but sadly, I have not found it to be a fact. In > fact, I'm shying away from kits now, due to the experiences I have had: Notice I said 'provide it as a kit', not 'provided it as a kit or ready made'. The point being that if _only_ the kit is available, people who want it have ot buy the kit, and they have to be clueful enough to put it together. > > * Through hole kits to make it easier for the hobbyist tends to > require more PCB space, which drives up the cost a bit (not a > major issue, but something to consider). Obviously, an SMT kit > would not suffer from this issue I really don't see the problem with SMD assembly at home... > * If you offer kits and complete units, people see the cost > difference, and they decide "they can do it". Then, they get it > down, it does not work, and then they take up lots of time asking > questions or trying to debug over email. > * Most people decide it's not worth the effort to solder, so they > just pay the extra anyway. OK, I am odd, but I have avoided buying some low-production-count designs becasue they were only avaialble ready-built. The main reason for this is that a kit comes with dcoumentation on how to assembly it and often a scheamtic. And with low-production devices, I can't count on the desinger/company being around in 5 years tinme when I need to fix it. I am going to haev to fix it myself. Given the scheamtic and the knowledge that I put it together in the first place, it's likely I can fix it. -tony From oltmansg at bellsouth.net Fri Mar 12 15:58:32 2010 From: oltmansg at bellsouth.net (Geoff Oltmans) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 15:58:32 -0600 Subject: HP 64000 Emulator? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Real dumb question: does an emulator exist (either through MESS or similar) for the HP 64000? From geoffr at zipcon.net Fri Mar 12 16:03:50 2010 From: geoffr at zipcon.net (Geoff Reed) Date: 12 Mar 2010 14:03:50 -0800 Subject: SD card on the "obvious" classic bus In-Reply-To: <4affc5e1003120818l252ddbb6ka6461638c03d2848@mail.gmail.com> References: <4affc5e1003120818l252ddbb6ka6461638c03d2848@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1268431430.4b9aba46d94a6@secure.zipcon.net> Quoting Joachim Thiemann : > Hello, with all this talk about SD card for QBUS machines, I was > wondering: SD (and SDHC) is easy to interface (if you're not too > concerned about speed) and has been attached to pretty much everything > under the sun; (well, I guess Jim is still working on the C= version > of IEEE-488) so is there anyone making an SD card drive for SCSI? > > To me that would be a very versatile classic interface; I'd love to > have a dead-silent drive for my Amiga, Macs and Sparcs. ST owners > would like it too, I'm sure. I know there is one company making > SCSI-to-CF interfaces, aimed primarily at old synthesizers > (http://www.scsiforsamplers.com/). > > Unfortunately, the online "search space" is somewhat poisoned due to > the fact that most Linux/BSD/whatever OS's use a SCSI emulation to > access SD cards - but eyeballing several pages of results I didn't > find any SD-to-SCSI devices. > > I certainly don't have the technical chops to make something like that > myself from scratch - but I'd guess a low-speed hack to do it could be > accomplished with a Atmel or similar chip with at least 21 IO pins (16 > for the SCSI side, 5 for the SD card) but I don't know what kind of > line drivers would be needed on the SCSI side. Is anyone aware of > such a project in the works? > > Joe. > > -- > Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem > there's currently a way, but it's a little convoluted. ACARD (or other) SCSI-IDE adapter - IDE-SD adapter -SD card. the adapter makes the SD look like an IDE drive. just remember you wouldn't want your swap on the SD card. From dgahling at hotmail.com Fri Mar 12 16:13:35 2010 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 17:13:35 -0500 Subject: Drive recovery In-Reply-To: <201003121816.o2CIGfrU043175@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET>, , <201003121816.o2CIGfrU043175@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: As I said, if it at least runs, etc A lot of recovery places just run software like this and charge $1200 for something you could do yourself. You have to consider, is the data that important? enough to spend several hundred $ on, or perhaps even $1400 or more? in most cases, it's not. my usb stick had data that was that important, the computer said the stick was unformatted. RTT goes it all back very easily. You're best to find a place that will do a free estimate, to tell you what can be recovered and how much it'll cost you, at least in cases where a drive is really far gone anyhow. Dan. > Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 12:16:26 -0600 > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > From: jfoust at threedee.com > Subject: RE: Drive recovery > > At 08:46 AM 3/12/2010, Dan Gahlinger wrote: > > >If the drive actually runs and is detectable, > >I'd suggest running RTT (RType) on it. > > You mean http://www.r-tt.com/ 's R-Studio. > > Yes, I have that. Works great when the drive is still capable > of getting to some or all of the data. Mine is clearly not. > > - John > _________________________________________________________________ Live connected with Messenger on your phone http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9712958 From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Fri Mar 12 18:01:29 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 00:01:29 +0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9AD5D9.3040604@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: > Notice I said 'provide it as a kit', not 'provided it as a kit or ready > made'. The point being that if _only_ the kit is available, people who > want it have ot buy the kit, and they have to be clueful enough to put it > together. Like I said before, though -- the DiscFerret is an almost completely SMD design. In fact, the only parts of the board that aren't SMD are the USB connector (a Lumberg thru-hole B-type "device" connector), the power connector (Switchcraft RAPC722 2.1mm DC barrel socket), and the interface connector (40-pin right-angled IDC with latch ears). As a bare minimum, if I made a kit, I'd want to supply it with the power controller chip soldered down (the aforementioned QFN chip -- TI TPS75003). That's simply because the leads don't extend up the side of the package, which makes it close to impossible to solder down without a hot-air station. Pin pitch is an eye watering 0.5mm, and there are 20 pins to solder, plus the under-chip ground/heatsink pad. The LM2679 Simple Switcher chip is tame by comparison (1.27mm pin pitch aka 50 mil or half DIL pitch), and the solder tab extends past the plastic body, so is dead easy to solder down to the heatsink plane. The FPGA is narrow pitch (0.5mm QFP), but can be soldered down using "drag soldering" -- basically cover the pins in gel flux and run a hot soldering iron down an entire row of pins at once. Same goes for the J-lead or TSOP-II SRAM chip -- soak it in flux and drag-solder it. Replacement isn't hard either -- in some ways it's easier than thru-hole because the through-plating doesn't tend to suck away heat or get filled with solder that just won't melt. Either hit it with a hot air gun, or Chipquik works terrifically well on leaded chips. The latter is basically Wood's Metal and a special flux. > I really don't see the problem with SMD assembly at home... I don't -- I've done it, it's a snap once you know the tricks. The problem I have is that if I sell these things as kits, someone's going to send one back and RMA it because they f00ked the soldering. The other problem is that the PICmicro is supplied blank, so anyone building a DF would have to have a PIC programmer. Admittedly they're not expensive (a brand-new PICKit2 costs about ?30 with the Debug Express demo board or about ?20 without). Once you've flashed in the bootloader, the chip can have the Usercode (the non-bootloader bit of the firmware) and Microcode loaded over USB. The trick is getting the bootloader in there in the first place... > OK, I am odd, but I have avoided buying some low-production-count designs > becasue they were only avaialble ready-built. The main reason for this is > that a kit comes with dcoumentation on how to assembly it and often a > scheamtic. Would this be more to your liking? User's Guide / Programming Guide Software installation / basic usage Hardware pinouts -- disc interface / power connectors API documentation and USB control protocol Firmware theory of operation (possibly useful if you want to play with it at a lower level than DiscAPI allows) Service Manual Schematics PCB layout diagram (x2 magnified) PCB top and bottom layer (x2 magnified) (useful if a trace gets burned away!) Parts manifest Assembly instructions (for kits) Hardware theory of operation (for each major section) (no sense in building a kit if you don't know how it works!) > Given the scheamtic and the knowledge that I put it together in the first > place, it's likely I can fix it. Unless a failed part is NLA... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From brain at jbrain.com Fri Mar 12 20:07:46 2010 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 20:07:46 -0600 Subject: SD card on the "obvious" classic bus In-Reply-To: <4affc5e1003120818l252ddbb6ka6461638c03d2848@mail.gmail.com> References: <4affc5e1003120818l252ddbb6ka6461638c03d2848@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4B9AF372.8040107@jbrain.com> On 3/12/2010 10:18 AM, Joachim Thiemann wrote: > Hello, with all this talk about SD card for QBUS machines, I was > wondering: SD (and SDHC) is easy to interface (if you're not too > concerned about speed) and has been attached to pretty much everything > under the sun; (well, I guess Jim is still working on the C= version > of IEEE-488) so is there anyone making an SD card drive for SCSI? > > To me that would be a very versatile classic interface; I'd love to > have a dead-silent drive for my Amiga, Macs and Sparcs. ST owners > would like it too, I'm sure. I know there is one company making > SCSI-to-CF interfaces, aimed primarily at old synthesizers > (http://www.scsiforsamplers.com/). > > A number of CMD HD owners have created a SCSI->IDE->SD interface. You can google for CMD HD IDE SCSI SD for more information and part numbers. 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 Fri Mar 12 20:53:41 2010 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 20:53:41 -0600 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9AFE35.6050004@jbrain.com> > Notice I said 'provide it as a kit', not 'provided it as a kit or ready > made'. The point being that if _only_ the kit is available, people who > want it have ot buy the kit, and they have to be clueful enough to put it > together. > I see the distinction, but I feel it's infeasible to offer just kits. Not only does it mean limiting exposure of a product via bypassing assembled unit sales (which appear to be 10 to 1 over kit sales) just to eliminate assembly support, but it also means ticking off a number of prospective customers who have no concerns buying finished units and will complain on the boards if a finished unit is not available, killing a certain amount of kits sales. Now, we can debate it, but I feel offering economical products means ordering parts in 100 unit batches, and I don't want to sit on stock any longer than necessary. > I really don't see the problem with SMD assembly at home... > Most hobbyists do not possess the tools needed to do SMT. > > OK, I am odd, but I have avoided buying some low-production-count designs > becasue they were only avaialble ready-built. The main reason for this is > that a kit comes with dcoumentation on how to assembly it and often a > scheamtic. And with low-production devices, I can't count on the > desinger/company being around in 5 years tinme when I need to fix it. I > am going to haev to fix it myself. > I understand, but I think you should rethink that viewpoint for projects that are released as open source. Such a license ensures you have all of the information in order to do repairs, in my opinion. We may never see eye to eye on this, but I think my position is the one many manufacturers are taking, and thus the option for kit-only projects may disappear. Jim From derschjo at mail.msu.edu Sat Mar 13 00:08:34 2010 From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 22:08:34 -0800 Subject: Looking for: VCB02 cable & mouse Message-ID: <4B9B2BE2.6050805@mail.msu.edu> Recently acquired a VCB02 (thanks again, Ulli!) which I hope to get running in my MicroVAX III. I'm looking for the cable that connects from the bulkhead to the monitor, keyboard and mouse (my research has revealed this to be referred to as "BC18Z-10" in DEC documentation). I have a compatible keyboard, but I'd like to find a mouse as well... Anyone have one to spare, or know of a decent supplier? Thanks, Josh From glen.slick at gmail.com Sat Mar 13 01:46:53 2010 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 23:46:53 -0800 Subject: Looking for: VCB02 cable & mouse In-Reply-To: <4B9B2BE2.6050805@mail.msu.edu> References: <4B9B2BE2.6050805@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e91003122346g23aa0b16nb1e1101d38bc10c@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Mar 12, 2010 at 10:08 PM, Josh Dersch wrote: > Recently acquired a VCB02 (thanks again, Ulli!) which I hope to get running > in my MicroVAX III. ?I'm looking for the cable that connects from the > bulkhead to the monitor, keyboard and mouse (my research has revealed this > to be referred to as "BC18Z-10" in DEC documentation). ?I have a compatible > keyboard, but I'd like to find a mouse as well... > > Anyone have one to spare, or know of a decent supplier? > > Thanks, > Josh > I got a BC18Z a year or so ago from jtcomputer. Listed for $10 currenlty They also list a VSXXX-AA for $15. Might be able to find the mouse cheaper elsewhere, but then separate shipping adds up too. www.jtcomputer.com From julianskidmore at yahoo.com Fri Mar 12 17:19:50 2010 From: julianskidmore at yahoo.com (Julian Skidmore) Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2010 15:19:50 -0800 (PST) Subject: SD card on the "obvious" classic bus Message-ID: <911988.64166.qm@web111713.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Hi folks, Joachim Thiemann wrote: > so is there anyone making an SD card drive for SCSI? A good one to look at is: http://www.circuitgeek.com/the-outstanding-avr-based-scsi-ram-disk/ The above project has also been adapted to work with a standard ATA hard disk and Compact Flash. It's an open development project: you can download the source code to the firmware and schematics. His website seems to be down right now though. And there's also this: http://www.reactivedata.com/Products/SCSI_Bridge_Emulators_to_CF/index.php It seems to me that a good route would be to build, say a QBUS card driven by a microcontroller. Given that even an AVR can handle SCSI comms at a hardware level by itself it can probably handle MSCP and a lot of the interface logic. -cheers from julz @P From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Sat Mar 13 03:45:23 2010 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 10:45:23 +0100 (CET) Subject: Drive recovery In-Reply-To: References: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET>, , <201003121816.o2CIGfrU043175@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: On Fri, 12 Mar 2010, Dan Gahlinger wrote: > my usb stick had data that was that important, the computer said the > stick was unformatted. RTT goes it all back very easily. Is it free? I think not. I'd use dd, loopback devices etc. or even a tool called Foremost. Christian From dgahling at hotmail.com Sat Mar 13 10:06:37 2010 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 11:06:37 -0500 Subject: Drive recovery In-Reply-To: References: <201003121227.o2CCRTjI022865@billY.EZWIND.NET>, , , , <201003121816.o2CIGfrU043175@billY.EZWIND.NET>, , Message-ID: its not free, but it is not very expensive. its very cheap. yeah i tried dd, wouldn't work. i tried the demo version of rtt (lets you see what it can recover at no cost). decided it was worth it. Dan. > Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 10:45:23 +0100 > From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: RE: Drive recovery > > On Fri, 12 Mar 2010, Dan Gahlinger wrote: > > my usb stick had data that was that important, the computer said the > > stick was unformatted. RTT goes it all back very easily. > > Is it free? I think not. I'd use dd, loopback devices etc. or even a tool > called Foremost. > > Christian _________________________________________________________________ Take your contacts everywhere http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9712959 From chd at chdickman.com Sat Mar 13 13:49:38 2010 From: chd at chdickman.com (Charles H Dickman) Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 14:49:38 -0500 Subject: test Message-ID: <4B9BEC52.2080702@chdickman.com> This is a test. This is only a test. If this had been an actual emergency, you would have been instructed.... From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 13 13:47:55 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 19:47:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: <4B9AD5D9.3040604@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 13, 10 00:01:29 am Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > > Notice I said 'provide it as a kit', not 'provided it as a kit or ready= > =20 > > made'. The point being that if _only_ the kit is available, people who=20 > > want it have ot buy the kit, and they have to be clueful enough to put = > it=20 > > together. > > Like I said before, though -- the DiscFerret is an almost completely SMD=20 > design. In fact, the only parts of the board that aren't SMD are the USB=20 > connector (a Lumberg thru-hole B-type "device" connector), the power=20 > connector (Switchcraft RAPC722 2.1mm DC barrel socket), and the=20 > interface connector (40-pin right-angled IDC with latch ears). > > As a bare minimum, if I made a kit, I'd want to supply it with the power=20 > controller chip soldered down (the aforementioned QFN chip -- TI=20 > TPS75003). That's simply because the leads don't extend up the side of=20 Is thatere any particular reason that you're using this chip? I haven't got the data sheet, but what does it do that can't be done with easier-to-solder components? > > Would this be more to your liking? Err, yes.. But it doesn't need to be 2 separae manuals. Nothing wrong with a comminder 'operating/sercice manual' > > User's Guide / Programming Guide > Software installation / basic usage > Hardware pinouts -- disc interface / power connectors > API documentation and USB control protocol > Firmware theory of operation > (possibly useful if you want to play with it at a lower level=20 > than DiscAPI allows) Firmware source listing? > > Service Manual > Schematics > PCB layout diagram (x2 magnified) > PCB top and bottom layer (x2 magnified) > (useful if a trace gets burned away!) > Parts manifest > Assembly instructions (for kits) > Hardware theory of operation (for each major section) > (no sense in building a kit if you don't know how it works!) FPGA souce? PAL/CPLD equations? > > > Given the scheamtic and the knowledge that I put it together in the fir= > st=20 > > place, it's likely I can fix it. > > Unless a failed part is NLA... Not so. If I genuinely know what the defective part is, there;'s a good cahnce I can kludge up some replacemnt from bits I can get. Of course if the unit is am FPGA + PSU + not much else ad the FPGA is what's failed and NLA, it might be easier to make up a new PCB to take the replacement FPGA and move the PSU parts onto it... I can assure you that if parts being NLA stopped me from repairing something then many of my classic computers wouldn't be operational. -tony From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Sat Mar 13 15:16:20 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 21:16:20 +0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9C00A4.5020705@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: >> As a bare minimum, if I made a kit, I'd want to supply it with the power=20 >> controller chip soldered down (the aforementioned QFN chip -- TI=20 >> TPS75003). That's simply because the leads don't extend up the side of=20 > > Is thatere any particular reason that you're using this chip? I haven't > got the data sheet, but what does it do that can't be done with > easier-to-solder components? The FPGA needs the power to be sequenced in the order: VCORE up short delay VIO up another short delay release RESET and load microcode Additionally, there is a minimum and maximum ramp rates for VCORE and VIO; go too slowly and the POR doesn't work properly, go too fast and the FPGA can "potentially enter a latch-up situation" according to the datasheet. It's far easier to just use a solution that Altera have given the rubber-stamped seal of approval to. In this case, it also costs less than half of what a similar design using standard SMPSU controller chips (e.g. something from the NatSemi Simple Switcher series) would cost. So effectively I'm getting to tick three boxes: 1) It's less likely to Blow Stuff Up 2) Altera say it'll work with the FPGA chip, thus I get to yell at them if it doesn't. Also TI are saying it'll work, and they provide a reference design for the chip I'm using, which is another bonus. 3) It's Cheap. Cheaper, in fact, than the 5V pre-regulator (the NSC Simple Switcher part). But in exchange I can't tick this box: 4) It's easy to solder the chip down to the PCB So it's a trade-off. Alternatively I can get a chip that meets criteria (4), but not (1), (2) and (3). Also, FPGAs are expensive -- you generally don't want Bad Things to happen to them! The hard (or at least expensive) part is going to be dealing with the EMC regs... On the plus side, the 12V input means it's exempt from LVD regs ("that would be the power supply manufacturer's problem, not mine") > Firmware source listing? On the website and a CD-R that I plan to include in the box :) > FPGA souce? PAL/CPLD equations? No PALs or CPLDs, but the FPGA source is included with the MCU source. > I can assure you that if parts being NLA stopped me from repairing > something then many of my classic computers wouldn't be operational. 8^) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Sat Mar 13 16:30:38 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 22:30:38 -0000 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfortzone? References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net><010201cabfd1$b329c690$edfdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4B992FE6.3010001@verizon.net> Message-ID: <00c701cac30c$81ef06b0$16fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Keith" To: ; "Discussion at olddell.com :On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 6:01 PM Subject: Re: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfortzone? > Andrew Burton wrote: > > Considering that I have never been on a programming course and have entirely > > tought myself from books and examining code, I would say that I mostly stick > > to what I know and only learn new stuff (coding techniques, new languages > > etc.) when I have to. In the last 5 years that includes compression (LZW and > > RTE/RLE), complements (2, 9 and 10), the .BMP format (urgh, why have it all > > upside down and back to front deliberately!), BCD numbers, CSV files and > > various other things. > > Hahaha. I looked at BMP recently. For some image processing application > I was thinking about writing. > > >[1] Motorola 68000 ASM was very easy to pick up and understand, > > but I am still learning techniques to make my code more efficient :) > > One of my side projects is learning 68000 code for 1> eventually build > my own 68k computer, and 2> understand the amiga much better. > > Keith I certainly understand the Amiga much better now. Though it does make most demos less impressive now, as I can easily work out how most of it is done. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Sat Mar 13 17:09:46 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 23:09:46 -0000 Subject: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) References: <20100310130535.P82671@shell.lmi.net> <20100310155701.X85384@shell.lmi.net><4B98B1CA.5050403@philpem.me.uk> <4B9930E0.2060307@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <00c801cac30c$835637d0$16fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Philip Pemberton" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 6:05 PM Subject: Re: Soldering (Was: Re: HP-IB, Amigo/cs80 ... ) > > Gotta love big business. The bigger it gets, the dumber it gets. > I couldn't agree more with that statement. Since the start of this month I no longer need to ring work to let them know when I'm off ill - I now call an external company who will then call my boss! I only drink lemonade when programming, I gave up cola several years back. The occasional snack (crisps or a chocolate bar) helps too :) Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From wdonzelli at gmail.com Sat Mar 13 20:50:45 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 21:50:45 -0500 Subject: APTEC board Message-ID: I have a little board (2 by 3 inches) with a few TTL chips (7408 and 7474s) with a short ribbon cable terminated with a 14 pin DIP header. No numbers, but the board says APTEC, 1976 REV B, and a "phase 2" symbol. I think this was part of some old microcomputer stuff I used to have. Any ideas what it could be? -- Will From cclist at sydex.com Sat Mar 13 21:46:46 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 19:46:46 -0800 Subject: APTEC board In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9BEBA6.6618.2D48684@cclist.sydex.com> On 13 Mar 2010 at 21:50, William Donzelli wrote: > I have a little board (2 by 3 inches) with a few TTL chips (7408 and > 7474s) with a short ribbon cable terminated with a 14 pin DIP header. > No numbers, but the board says APTEC, 1976 REV B, and a "phase 2" > symbol. I think this was part of some old microcomputer stuff I used > to have. Any ideas what it could be? Well, there was Advanced Peripheral Technology who used the acronym APTEC. They dealt in stuff like tape drives. Ring any bells? --Chuck From trixter at oldskool.org Sun Mar 14 14:37:26 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 14:37:26 -0500 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <4B968A55.90706@comcast.net> References: <000001cabf73$4ac529e0$4d01a8c0@jovica132a8344> <4B968A55.90706@comcast.net> Message-ID: <4B9D3AF6.8010105@oldskool.org> As previously discussed in this list, and documented on http://www.oldskool.org/pc/cgacal , CGA monitors have circuitry to change color index #6 to a different color. CGA also has a fourth "intensity" pin. Does anyone know if some sort of specially-wired cable might be able to convert 4-pin RGBI to something these kinds of converters can take as input and everything will still look decently? I ask because I have a need to do video capture of native CGA output. Don't ask :-) The best solution I've come up with is to use an older VGA card (1990 or before) that comes with utilities to force it into CGA emulation -- forces 400 scandoubled lines, forces the 8x8 font, and ports react properly to MC6845 writes. This is 95% of the way there, but it's still a 70Hz refresh rate, not 60. All ideas welcome. On 3/9/2010 11:50 AM, Dan Roganti wrote: > Jovica Stojoski wrote: >> Hi, >> >> I need scematics of RGB to VGA converter. > > we use one of these, it's almost universal , RGB/CGA/EGA/YUV to VGA > Converter > more details on the website > http://www.jammaboards.com/store/cga/ega/yuv-to-vga-converter-pcb-gbs-8220/prod_291.html > > only $50 > > =Dan > > -- 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 julian at twinax.org Sun Mar 14 15:17:31 2010 From: julian at twinax.org (Julian Wolfe) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 15:17:31 -0500 Subject: Selling my Commodore 128D, if anyone's interested. Message-ID: <000c01cac3b3$63a265b0$2ae73110$@org> So, I've decided to part with my 128D, as I already have a flat 128 which I prefer: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem &item=300406951107 Julian From rtellason at verizon.net Sun Mar 14 15:22:34 2010 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason, Sr.) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 15:22:34 -0500 Subject: books offered Message-ID: <201003141622.34350.rtellason@verizon.net> Got a few here that might be of interest to folks on the list: -- Fundamentals of COBOL Programming (1968, 1973) -- Programs for Electronic Circuit Design (1986), Radio Shack -- How to Build A Working Digital Computer (1969) Hayden -- Writing BASIC Adventure Programs for the TRS-80 (1982) Tab These (along with a couple hundred others) I have listed on Amazon, but feel free to contact me off-list and let me know if you'd like any of them. I'd like to cover shipping costs, and "a little extra" and get them into the hands of somebody that wants them. Oh, and I still have that IBM binder mentioned in an earlier post -- got three replies, wrote three responses to 'em, and so far nobody has gotten back to me yet to answer "What do you care to offer for it", I'm not just gonna eat the postage, etc. :-) -- 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 robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com Sun Mar 14 15:48:25 2010 From: robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com (Rob Jarratt) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 20:48:25 -0000 Subject: books offered In-Reply-To: <201003141622.34350.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <201003141622.34350.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <001501cac3b7$b2a1a550$17e4eff0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Roy J. Tellason, Sr. > Sent: 14 March 2010 20:23 > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: books offered > > Got a few here that might be of interest to folks on the list: > > -- Fundamentals of COBOL Programming (1968, 1973) > -- Programs for Electronic Circuit Design (1986), Radio Shack > -- How to Build A Working Digital Computer (1969) Hayden > -- Writing BASIC Adventure Programs for the TRS-80 (1982) Tab > > These (along with a couple hundred others) I have listed on Amazon, > but feel > free to contact me off-list and let me know if you'd like any of them. > I'd > like to cover shipping costs, and "a little extra" and get them into > the > hands of somebody that wants them. > > Oh, and I still have that IBM binder mentioned in an earlier post -- > got > three replies, wrote three responses to 'em, and so far nobody has > gotten > back to me yet to answer "What do you care to offer for it", I'm not > just > gonna eat the postage, etc. :-) > > > -- > 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 How does one find your particular listings on Amazon? Regards Rob From julian at twinax.org Sun Mar 14 16:21:17 2010 From: julian at twinax.org (Julian Wolfe) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 16:21:17 -0500 Subject: Selling my SBC6120 (PDP8) Message-ID: <002801cac3bc$49e0d5e0$dda281a0$@org> Just thought I'd let people interested know I'm selling my SBC6120 board, it's a first run, but still quyite useful, when you look at the new ones that run $600 for a kit. It includes the CPU. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300406995665 From shumaker at att.net Sun Mar 14 16:22:10 2010 From: shumaker at att.net (steve shumaker) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 17:22:10 -0400 Subject: books offered In-Reply-To: <201003141622.34350.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <201003141622.34350.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4B9D5382.6050605@att.net> that's quite a set of topics in Amazon! do they represent span of personal interest or just books for sale? steve Roy J. Tellason, Sr. wrote: > Got a few here that might be of interest to folks on the list: > > -- Fundamentals of COBOL Programming (1968, 1973) > -- Programs for Electronic Circuit Design (1986), Radio Shack > -- How to Build A Working Digital Computer (1969) Hayden > -- Writing BASIC Adventure Programs for the TRS-80 (1982) Tab > > These (along with a couple hundred others) I have listed on Amazon, but feel > free to contact me off-list and let me know if you'd like any of them. I'd > like to cover shipping costs, and "a little extra" and get them into the > hands of somebody that wants them. > > Oh, and I still have that IBM binder mentioned in an earlier post -- got > three replies, wrote three responses to 'em, and so far nobody has gotten > back to me yet to answer "What do you care to offer for it", I'm not just > gonna eat the postage, etc. :-) > > > From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 14 16:29:03 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 21:29:03 +0000 (GMT) Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <4B9D3AF6.8010105@oldskool.org> from "Jim Leonard" at Mar 14, 10 02:37:26 pm Message-ID: > > As previously discussed in this list, and documented on > http://www.oldskool.org/pc/cgacal , CGA monitors have circuitry to > change color index #6 to a different color. CGA also has a fourth > "intensity" pin. Does anyone know if some sort of specially-wired cable > might be able to convert 4-pin RGBI to something these kinds of > converters can take as input and everything will still look decently? It's goign to take more than a cable. THere must be components involved. > > I ask because I have a need to do video capture of native CGA output. > Don't ask :-) If this is a real CGA card, there is most likely an NTSC-compatible composoite colour output available too. It may be on an RCA phono socket on the bracket (IBM had that), a header inside, or sometimes on pin 7 (otherwise unused) of the DE9 socket. You might look at the IBM CGA card scheamtics. They include the circuit to encode the RGBI signals to NTSC composite video. -tony From trixter at oldskool.org Sun Mar 14 17:22:48 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 17:22:48 -0500 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9D61B8.1040900@oldskool.org> On 3/14/2010 4:29 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> > If this is a real CGA card, there is most likely an NTSC-compatible > composoite colour output available too. It may be on an RCA phono socket > on the bracket (IBM had that), a header inside, or sometimes on pin 7 > (otherwise unused) of the DE9 socket. The colors are not the same, which is why I can't use that technique. -- 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 shumaker at att.net Mon Mar 15 04:56:21 2010 From: shumaker at att.net (shumaker at att.net) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 09:56:21 +0000 Subject: Old Equipment for sale, PDP8 and S100, with manuals In-Reply-To: <77d877581003141635s66b13b41j605cf255454b1d32@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <031520100956.17389.4B9E04450007A7C8000043ED22230703729B0A02D29B9B0EBF9D0A050E039A089C@att.net> where are you? steve -------------- Original message from Darrell Norquay <1metalguru at gmail.com>: -------------- > Hi Guys: > > Just thought I would drop a line and let everyone know that I have some old > computer equipment for sale (might even be free to a good home) as listed > below: > > 1. PDP8A system, with programming front panel. Comes with PDP8/A Field > Drawings Manual, and I believe it has an A/D peripheral. > 2. Somewhere, (I haven't seen them for years) I have a pretty extensive > library of PDP8/I manuals on Microfiche. This includes the 32K Disk > Subsystem, Hi Speed Paper Tape reader, PDP8/I Math enhancement, Dectape > System, etc. Used to have the paper copies, but they were > too bulky so I paid to have them put on Microfiche (which was quite pricey > as I recall). > > If anyone is interested, I'll try to come up with more info, including a > complete list of the manuals on fiche, and a list of the boards installed in > the 8/A. > > I also have some old modems, including one from an ASR33 TTY, and a 1200 > Baud commercial modem from the early 80's. In addition, I have a > couple of old S-100 System enclosures with backplanes and power supplies, > along with a whole box of S-100 boards including 8085 CPU, memory, > A/D, comm cards, and various I/O. Even some manuals to go with... > > My name is Darrell, and you can contact me at 1MetalGuru(at)gmail.com From silvercreekvalley at yahoo.com Mon Mar 15 06:32:13 2010 From: silvercreekvalley at yahoo.com (silvercreekvalley) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 04:32:13 -0700 (PDT) Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? Message-ID: <478582.76987.qm@web56203.mail.re3.yahoo.com> Ive used lots of RGB/VGA converters over the years for various bits of equipment, mainly older 8 bit micros. There never seems to be a one solution to fit every case, and I've found that different converters work best with different systems. Sometimes I've found using two converters works best, eg going from RGB + composite sync to composite video, and then from composite video to VGA. Just my 2c From csquared3 at tx.rr.com Sun Mar 14 14:39:36 2010 From: csquared3 at tx.rr.com (CSquared) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 14:39:36 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9D3B78.5070107@tx.rr.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> #40 is really, really thin (<0.08 mm, ~0.003in), only likely to be used for >> winding coils. > > And darn hard to find in sensible quantities... > >> I was rewinding a coil with #38 a couple weeks ago, not much latitude for >> indelicate slip-ups. >> > > I rewound a couple of motors useing 38swg wire (5 thou, 0.15mm or > thereabouts) a month or two ago. It was a lot easier than I expected, > even though I got the connections to the commutator wrong the first time > and had to wind that armature again. > > Actually, this was on-topic. The motors were from an HP9125A plotter, > which is used with the HP9100 calculator. The HP9125 is all discrete > transsitors (mostly bipolar, but a few JFETs), there are almost 100 > transistors on each DAC board. > > -tony > > I've done a bit of that too over the years, just a few motors but more transformers. One thing that has always troubled me is the usual poor condition of what I believe is at least sometimes called the "fish paper" used to provide extra insulation between the coating on the wires and the stator/armature/core metal. Back in my younger more foolish days I'm afraid I was sometimes guilty of using ordinary card stock as a solution, though I've wondered if that is not a bit of a fire hazard in spite of "Fahrenheit 451". I'd just be interested in hearing your thoughts on this issue. Thanks, Charlie C. From 1metalguru at gmail.com Sun Mar 14 18:35:38 2010 From: 1metalguru at gmail.com (Darrell Norquay) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 17:35:38 -0600 Subject: Old Equipment for sale, PDP8 and S100, with manuals Message-ID: <77d877581003141635s66b13b41j605cf255454b1d32@mail.gmail.com> Hi Guys: Just thought I would drop a line and let everyone know that I have some old computer equipment for sale (might even be free to a good home) as listed below: 1. PDP8A system, with programming front panel. Comes with PDP8/A Field Drawings Manual, and I believe it has an A/D peripheral. 2. Somewhere, (I haven't seen them for years) I have a pretty extensive library of PDP8/I manuals on Microfiche. This includes the 32K Disk Subsystem, Hi Speed Paper Tape reader, PDP8/I Math enhancement, Dectape System, etc. Used to have the paper copies, but they were too bulky so I paid to have them put on Microfiche (which was quite pricey as I recall). If anyone is interested, I'll try to come up with more info, including a complete list of the manuals on fiche, and a list of the boards installed in the 8/A. I also have some old modems, including one from an ASR33 TTY, and a 1200 Baud commercial modem from the early 80's. In addition, I have a couple of old S-100 System enclosures with backplanes and power supplies, along with a whole box of S-100 boards including 8085 CPU, memory, A/D, comm cards, and various I/O. Even some manuals to go with... My name is Darrell, and you can contact me at 1MetalGuru(at)gmail.com From lproven at gmail.com Mon Mar 15 13:20:19 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 18:20:19 +0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation Message-ID: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI disks of <1GB. But I want to get it working & looking at the old dead kit pile. As far as I know you can't boot a traditional VAX from a disk of <1GB... but could I put the core of VMS on a small slow narrow SCSI disk, like an 80MB or something, and put most of it on the only Wide SCSI disk I have, a 10GB...? I was considering either attaching an external SCSI2 disk of 80-120GB, or possibly trying to fit one internally if I can find an appropriate convertor. I have a fast/wide 8GB or 10GB disk I could use for main storage, but I don't think I can boot from it... Can I? My VMS knowledge is /very/ rusty & I was only ever a sysadmin, not a developer. I've never brought up a bare system or anything. Also, I have several external SCSI CD-ROMs, including 2 Apple units. I seem to recall that VAXen want a weird block size, same as Sun kit... is that correct? How would one tell if a certain drive could do this or not? Is it a DIP switch setting or just a SCSI bus command? -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 15 13:28:20 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 14:28:20 -0400 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> On Mar 15, 2010, at 2:20 PM, Liam Proven wrote: > I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely > sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI > disks of <1GB. That machine doesn't have wide SCSI. It's 8-bit ("narrow") 10MHz. > As far as I know you can't boot a traditional VAX from a disk of > <1GB... but could I put the core of VMS on a small slow narrow SCSI > disk, like an > 80MB or something, and put most of it on the only Wide SCSI disk I > have, a 10GB...? You can use a sub-1GB disk to boot from, yes. Booting is, as I understand it, the only restriction. > Also, I have several external SCSI CD-ROMs, including 2 Apple units. I > seem to recall that VAXen want a weird block size, same as Sun kit... > is that correct? How would one tell if a certain drive could do this > or not? Is it a DIP switch setting or just a SCSI bus command? You need a drive that supports 512-byte blocks. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From IanK at vulcan.com Mon Mar 15 13:52:49 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 11:52:49 -0700 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Dave McGuire > Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 11:28 AM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Booting a VAXstation > > On Mar 15, 2010, at 2:20 PM, Liam Proven wrote: > > I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely > > sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI > > disks of <1GB. > > That machine doesn't have wide SCSI. It's 8-bit ("narrow") 10MHz. > > > As far as I know you can't boot a traditional VAX from a disk of > > <1GB... but could I put the core of VMS on a small slow narrow SCSI > > disk, like an > > 80MB or something, and put most of it on the only Wide SCSI disk I > > have, a 10GB...? > > You can use a sub-1GB disk to boot from, yes. Booting is, as I > understand it, the only restriction. > > > Also, I have several external SCSI CD-ROMs, including 2 Apple units. > I > > seem to recall that VAXen want a weird block size, same as Sun kit... > > is that correct? How would one tell if a certain drive could do this > > or not? Is it a DIP switch setting or just a SCSI bus command? > > You need a drive that supports 512-byte blocks. > > -Dave > I have found such CD-ROM drives to be both plentiful and cheap at local second-hand stores. Since they won't work with a PC, they have 'no' value.... I have installed the core of VMS and booted from a small-ish drive, but you rapidly run out of space. -- Ian From roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk Mon Mar 15 14:06:11 2010 From: roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk (Roger Holmes) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 19:06:11 +0000 Subject: Computer on eBay probably analogue In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <0D99EC03-0995-4B0E-B2EC-C6BF98C76A8E@microspot.co.uk> There's a strange computer in Kansas USA on eBay, wrong side of the pond for me anyway. It appears to be for calculating milling machine feed rates. The seller seems to think its a CNC control box but I'm fairly sure it isn't. I found it interesting anyway, the item number is 320502473280. No connection to the seller. From ploopster at gmail.com Mon Mar 15 14:07:48 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 15:07:48 -0400 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4B9E8584.1000007@gmail.com> Ian King wrote: > I have found such CD-ROM drives to be both plentiful and cheap at local second-hand stores. Since they won't work with a PC, they have 'no' value.... There are many many PC-compatible CD-ROMs that also talk 512-byte sectors. There might be some in your/his pile already. > I have installed the core of VMS and booted from a small-ish drive, but you rapidly run out of space. -- Ian Is it possible to boot VMS in a small partition in the beginning of a disk and have another partition elsewhere? I've never had cause to try this, since I have a giant pile of 500-1000MB disks lying around. Peace... Sridhar From IanK at vulcan.com Mon Mar 15 14:15:31 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 12:15:31 -0700 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <4B9E8584.1000007@gmail.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> <4B9E8584.1000007@gmail.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Sridhar Ayengar > Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 12:08 PM > To: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Booting a VAXstation > > Ian King wrote: > > I have found such CD-ROM drives to be both plentiful and cheap at > local second-hand stores. Since they won't work with a PC, they have > 'no' value.... > > There are many many PC-compatible CD-ROMs that also talk 512-byte > sectors. There might be some in your/his pile already. > > > I have installed the core of VMS and booted from a small-ish drive, > but you rapidly run out of space. -- Ian > > Is it possible to boot VMS in a small partition in the beginning of a > disk and have another partition elsewhere? I've never had cause to try > this, since I have a giant pile of 500-1000MB disks lying around. > > Peace... Sridhar Sure, although making sure you have all the logicals set right in the startup scripts can be tricky. -- Ian From IanK at vulcan.com Mon Mar 15 14:25:59 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 12:25:59 -0700 Subject: Computer on eBay probably analogue In-Reply-To: <0D99EC03-0995-4B0E-B2EC-C6BF98C76A8E@microspot.co.uk> References: <0D99EC03-0995-4B0E-B2EC-C6BF98C76A8E@microspot.co.uk> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Roger Holmes > Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 12:06 PM > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Computer on eBay probably analogue > > There's a strange computer in Kansas USA on eBay, wrong side of the > pond for me anyway. It appears to be for calculating milling machine > feed rates. The seller seems to think its a CNC control box but I'm > fairly sure it isn't. I found it interesting anyway, the item number is > 320502473280. No connection to the seller. > > I've seen systems like this before. Notice the 'Balance' meter? It's likely an elaborate bridge, where the goal is to twist knobs representing parameters until one achieves a solution as represented by a neutral position of the needle. For instance, one might be trading off cutting speed and tool life, taking into account depth of cut and the characteristics of the cutting tool (inferring from values on the various knobs). Very cool! -- Ian From julian at twinax.org Mon Mar 15 15:00:58 2010 From: julian at twinax.org (Julian Wolfe) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 15:00:58 -0500 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: <000e01cac47a$3bdf13d0$b39d3b70$@org> I'd really prefer RP emulation. This would allow use of older OS versions. I'd also really prefer to see a UNIBUS version. -----Original Message----- From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of e.stiebler Sent: Wednesday, March 10, 2010 6:50 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 Rob Jarratt wrote: > There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which ended up > with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to build an > FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD interface on Is there really still interest in it ? I put my design away few years ago, as I didn't see anybody interested enough to buy one. There is the seasonal talk of it for sure, but ... OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not that expensive. Remarks ? Cheers From arcarlini at iee.org Mon Mar 15 15:44:14 2010 From: arcarlini at iee.org (arcarlini at iee.org) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 20:44:14 -0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4553831056AA4605859E3046129B7A2B@ANTONIOPC> cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org wrote: > As far as I know you can't boot a traditional VAX from a disk > of <1GB... but could I put the core of VMS on a small slow > narrow SCSI disk, like an 80MB or something, and put most of > it on the only Wide SCSI disk I have, a 10GB...? I guess that a VS 3100-38 will happily talk to a wide disk if you use one of those "50-pin to whatever" converters: my VS 4K will talk to various 9GB IBM drives with 68-pin connectors (SCSI-2) and I have had it talk to drives with SCA connectors too. If you can find a console ROM dated later than (iirc) April 1992 then you can forget about the ~1GB issue. Obviously if you can find such a ROM, I'm probably not the only one who would be interested in an image of it :-) > I was considering either attaching an external SCSI2 disk of > 80-120GB, or possibly trying to fit one internally if I can > find an appropriate convertor. I have a fast/wide 8GB or 10GB > disk I could use for main storage, but I don't think I can > boot from it... Can I? Assuming the old style ROM, you'll have issues. You can do a bunch of fiddling but it's not easy and it will come back and bite you. You have to format the drive for ODS-2 and allocate all the space beyond the 1GB boundary to a disk image file (all this done, presumably on another machine). Then install OpenVMS and use LDDRIVER to access the rest of the disk as a logical device (LDA0:). > My VMS knowledge is /very/ rusty & I was only ever a > sysadmin, not a developer. I've never brought up a bare > system or anything. If you stick to a system disk < ~1.073GB (or find a newer ROM) you'll have no problems. > Also, I have several external SCSI CD-ROMs, including 2 Apple > units. I seem to recall that VAXen want a weird block size, > same as Sun kit... is that correct? How would one tell if a > certain drive could do this or not? Is it a DIP switch > setting or just a SCSI bus command? VAXen (and Sun boxes) want 512-byte sectors (or, rather, something that emulates 512-byte sectors). If it boots a bootable OpenVMS CD then it's comaptible :-) Antonio From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 15 16:15:19 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 21:15:19 +0000 (GMT) Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <4B9D61B8.1040900@oldskool.org> from "Jim Leonard" at Mar 14, 10 05:22:48 pm Message-ID: > > On 3/14/2010 4:29 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > >> > > If this is a real CGA card, there is most likely an NTSC-compatible > > composoite colour output available too. It may be on an RCA phono socket > > on the bracket (IBM had that), a header inside, or sometimes on pin 7 > > (otherwise unused) of the DE9 socket. > > The colors are not the same, which is why I can't use that technique. A few suggestions : 1) Have you tried adjusting the 14.3...MHz clock trimmer in the PC? The original IBM machines (including the 5161 expansion unit), and many older clones, have a trimmer across the crystal that's used for the 14.3...MHz oscillator (this is divided down to get the 3.58...MHx NTSC colour reference, of course). The IBM manuals recomend adjusting this if the colours are misisng/incorrect. I am not sure it will do any good, but it can't hurt. 2)If the colours are wrong but consistent, can't you modify them after digitising them? 3) Take a look at the CGA monitor scheamtic, particularly the part from the RGBI TTL inputs to the CRT cathodes. This will show you how the 4 TTL signals are ocmbined to produce analogue RGB signals. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 15 16:09:02 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 21:09:02 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B9D3B78.5070107@tx.rr.com> from "CSquared" at Mar 14, 10 02:39:36 pm Message-ID: > I've done a bit of that too over the years, just a few motors but more > transformers. One thing that has always troubled me is the usual poor I;ve done trasnformers too, but fortunately I've never had to do one that had to stand main voltage or similar. > condition of what I believe is at least sometimes called the "fish > paper" used to provide extra insulation between the coating on the wires I've certainly heard it called 'fish paper' over here. I am not sure if you can still buy it anywhere, if you can, I am looking for a source... > and the stator/armature/core metal. Back in my younger more foolish > days I'm afraid I was sometimes guilty of using ordinary card stock as a > solution, though I've wondered if that is not a bit of a fire hazard in Well, it probably is eeasier to ignite than fishpaper, but normal paper is not that easy to set on firs. A soldering iron won't do it, for example. If a transformer is getting hot enough to ignite paper, you have problems. My greater worry would be that the paper may absorb moisture and electrically break down.At one time paper soaked in wax was used, but this would seem to be an even greater fire risk. > spite of "Fahrenheit 451". I'd just be interested in hearing your > thoughts on this issue. I'd probably not do it in something that was going to be used by somebody else, or somethign that was going to run unattended. I might do it for something I was goping to use myself. -tony From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Mon Mar 15 16:44:49 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 21:44:49 -0000 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) References: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com><4B9957E1.6000006@arachelian.com> <06EB9B28607243ED93F7A90C2832C49F@dell8300> Message-ID: <005201cac490$8be1db90$f0fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Teo Zenios" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 10:25 PM Subject: Re: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) > I gave up drinking cola with caffeine and now mostly drink 7-up with > artificial sweeteners (you end up getting a sweet tooth late in the day). > > I used to guzzle mountain dew in the morning when I worked and I found if I > didn't my mind would be a little cloudy until I did so I gave it up. > > Yes, you do lose a bunch of weight when switching to diet pop, but you gain > it back slowly when you get a craving for sweets (you body doesn'y like to > be fooled by fake sweetener). You can say that again (the bit in brackets in the last sentence). If I drink Diet Cola it makes me sick, as in regurgitating what I ate recently. So I stay well away from diet drinks... but I have a few other allergies too (hayfever, asthma, eczema and certain plastics cause irration to my skin after contact for 5-10 minutes). I suppose I should count myself lucky that I'm not allergic to sunlight. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Mon Mar 15 17:49:43 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 16:49:43 -0600 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <005201cac490$8be1db90$f0fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> References: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com><4B9957E1.6000006@arachelian.com> <06EB9B28607243ED93F7A90C2832C49F@dell8300> <005201cac490$8be1db90$f0fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <4B9EB987.2090004@jetnet.ab.ca> Andrew Burton wrote: > You can say that again (the bit in brackets in the last sentence). If I > drink Diet Cola it makes me sick, as in regurgitating what I ate recently. > So I stay well away from diet drinks... but I have a few other allergies too > (hayfever, asthma, eczema and certain plastics cause irration to my skin > after contact for 5-10 minutes). I suppose I should count myself lucky that > I'm not allergic to sunlight. What about the other programing food: Pizza? > Regards, > Andrew B > aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk > From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Mar 15 18:21:23 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 18:21:23 -0500 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <4B98DE3B.26634.E5C317@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com> <4B98DE3B.26634.E5C317@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B9EC0F3.6030101@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 11 Mar 2010 at 13:56, Brian Lanning wrote: > >> Sometimes it sounds good to me and I'll get a can. I can't get through >> the whole can without giving up. It grosses me out and I'm cured for >> another 6 months. > > Yup, I gave up sweetened fizzy drinks and can't even handle a Coke if > someone offers one to me. Waaaaay too sweet with a peculiar medicine > taste. I don't mind it once in a while, just for a bit of variety - a glass once every couple of weeks or so, maybe. Not keen at all on diet stuff - tastes strange. > One cuppa coffee in the morning (it apparently has some benefit for > prostate health) and plain old (Lipton's or whatever's on sale) tea > for the rest of the day. I do add a little brandy to the last cup of > the day, however. :) I usually have a couple of mugs of coffee in a morning, usually one around 6:30 and then another around 10:30 or so, then tea (Lipton, cheap and crappy but I drink a lot of it) the rest of the day. > Best advice I ever got from a doctor. Him: "Do you drink?" Me: > "Not really." Him: "Maybe you should start." Ha ha - I've had exactly that same thing from a doc, too! cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Mar 15 18:38:11 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 18:38:11 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9EC4E3.3000207@gmail.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> At one point, I had a copy of the NASA standards for PCB modifications,=20 >> which covered green-wire fixes. I think it's online somewhere... Anyway,=20 >> for SMD parts (SOICs etc.) you're supposed to run a piece of wire along=20 >> the pin, then solder it to the pin. The icing on the cake is that you're=20 >> supposed to solder along the entire length of the pin, not just the land=20 >> pad. > > I wonder how necessary that is. The only time I've ever had problems just > soldering to the track was on a very poor quality SRBP board where the > tracks would lift if you looked at them wrong. Of course my application > is not as critical as NASA's ;-) I don't know - having seen your place, I can imagine you having some kind of launch vehicle in there somewhere. Possibly under a pile of other things, and you've forgotten that you have it... ;-) >> Enamelled copper wire is a pig to find in general. You are right though,=20 >> Maplin are usually one of the only places that stock it. > > It's certainly difficult to get in small-ish qunatities. It was frustrating when my wife was doing an accounting job for an electrical firm (who built stuff to order for folks such as GEC) - they often had wire that just went in a pile out back because an order had been screwed up or requirements had changed mid-job. I'm not sure if they recycled it somehow - possibly, but they certainly wouldn't let mere mortals anywhere near it. >> What annoys me is the scrapping of the in-store-order scheme. Basically,=20 >> if the store was out of stock of something, you could place a=20 >> back-order, and when it arrived (they sent it direct to the store in the=20 >> weekly stock replenishment) you could go and pick it up. Worked pretty=20 >> well for me. > > At one time, if you want to the shop and they were out of stock, you > could have it delieverd to any shop _or youe homw_ free of charge. Even > if it was just 1 resistor. Not any more. Yeah, I remember that too - I'd often take advantage of that and browse the catalogue in the shop, order a pile of stuff, and have whatever they couldn't do on the spot sent to my house. >> It's a shame about the magazine, though -- they published some pretty=20 >> neat projects, all of which could be built from parts available from=20 > > Indeed. I built many of them over the years. I rememebr watching > commetical for NICAM televisions using the Maplin NICAM tuner/decoder kit > and a greenscreen monitor :-) I remember drooling over that nicam hardware back in the day. That and the Z80 based home weather station. I built a couple of their 150W amplifiers, but I don't think I have them any more (just the rather large transformer that I used for the PSU). >> Maplins (with the occasional special-order), and the articles usually=20 >> did a pretty good job of explaining not just how the thing worked, but=20 >> also why it was designed in that specific way. > > I also have a virstually complete set of the magazines... I wonder if anyone has a plan to scan them? It'd be nice to see. I don't think I have any of mine any more. > I gave up Circuit Cellar and then Elektor when they both became 'yet > another microcontroller project' magazines. As you well know, I have > nothing against microcontrollers, but I don't think they're the _only_ > solution. There's just something... boring about them, somehow. And I know I shouldn't think like that, because they're not so different to a lot of the 8-bit stuff that I grew up with. cheers Jules From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 15 19:15:02 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 17:15:02 -0700 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <4B9EB987.2090004@jetnet.ab.ca> References: , <005201cac490$8be1db90$f0fdf93e@user8459cef6fa>, <4B9EB987.2090004@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4B9E6B16.24906.1C41815@cclist.sydex.com> On 15 Mar 2010 at 16:49, Ben wrote: > What about the other programing food: Pizza? I eat pizza, but I make it from scratch. The stuff sold from the chain outfits (Pizza Hut, etc.) is really dreadful and tends to make me sick. Good flour, cheese, tomatoes, garlic and olive oil is all you really need. --Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 15 19:20:30 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 17:20:30 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: <4B9D3B78.5070107@tx.rr.com> from "CSquared" at Mar 14, 10 02:39:36 pm, Message-ID: <4B9E6C5E.12985.1C919D2@cclist.sydex.com> On 15 Mar 2010 at 21:09, Tony Duell wrote: > I've certainly heard it called 'fish paper' over here. I am not sure > if you can still buy it anywhere, if you can, I am looking for a > source... Also sometimes called "leatheroid", a name about as mysterious as "fish paper". I imagine that kraft or resin paper soaked with beeswax or paraffin wax would do in a pinch. I remeber winding my own RF coils on a wooden bobbin and boiling them in beeswax. Great stuff, beeswasx. I discovered that paper as an insulator in undersea cables is useful as if the outer jacket springs a leak, the paper will swell with the moisture and prevent seawater from wicking the length of the cable. --Chuck From trixter at oldskool.org Mon Mar 15 20:45:09 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 20:45:09 -0500 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9EE2A5.6070505@oldskool.org> On 3/15/2010 4:15 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> > 1) Have you tried adjusting the 14.3...MHz clock trimmer in the PC? The > original IBM machines (including the 5161 expansion unit), and many older > clones, have a trimmer across the crystal that's used for the 14.3...MHz > oscillator (this is divided down to get the 3.58...MHx NTSC colour > reference, of course). The IBM manuals recomend adjusting this if the > colours are misisng/incorrect. I am not sure it will do any good, but it > can't hurt. I have tried, and all it does is change the hue (slightly). It doesn't make the colors any closer to their RGB equivalents. Mind you, some of the color combinations possible in composite color mode are fantastic > 2)If the colours are wrong but consistent, can't you modify them after > digitising them? Not easily. It's an analog capture and there are luma/chroma cross-talk issues that make things worse. I would only do that if desperate, and it still wouldn't look right. > 3) Take a look at the CGA monitor schematic, particularly the part from > the RGBI TTL inputs to the CRT cathodes. This will show you how the 4 TTL > signals are combined to produce analogue RGB signals. I would need to go to school to understand what I would be looking at. But my brother works at UL as a tester and has an electronics degree, so I will ask him. -- 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 bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Mon Mar 15 21:23:42 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 20:23:42 -0600 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B9E6C5E.12985.1C919D2@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4B9D3B78.5070107@tx.rr.com> from "CSquared" at Mar 14, 10 02:39:36 pm, <4B9E6C5E.12985.1C919D2@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4B9EEBAE.2060501@jetnet.ab.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 15 Mar 2010 at 21:09, Tony Duell wrote: > >> I've certainly heard it called 'fish paper' over here. I am not sure >> if you can still buy it anywhere, if you can, I am looking for a >> source... I thought old newspaper went with fish, or is that just cats. AES still sells that and few other kinds of paper. http://www.tubesandmore.com/ > Also sometimes called "leatheroid", a name about as mysterious as > "fish paper". I imagine that kraft or resin paper soaked with > beeswax or paraffin wax would do in a pinch. > > I remeber winding my own RF coils on a wooden bobbin and boiling them > in beeswax. Great stuff, beeswasx. What other uses do you it for other than candles? BTW you can now get beeswax & foil capacitors again, fot the audio freaks. > I discovered that paper as an insulator in undersea cables is useful > as if the outer jacket springs a leak, the paper will swell with the > moisture and prevent seawater from wicking the length of the cable. I wonder when the last undersea cable was layed? > > --Chuck > Ben... From gkicomputers at yahoo.com Mon Mar 15 21:33:19 2010 From: gkicomputers at yahoo.com (steve) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 19:33:19 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: <4B9EEBAE.2060501@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> http://shop.ebay.com/earlyapple/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=&_trksid=p4340 From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Mar 15 21:36:28 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 22:36:28 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B9EEBAE.2060501@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4B9D3B78.5070107@tx.rr.com> <4B9E6C5E.12985.1C919D2@cclist.sydex.com> <4B9EEBAE.2060501@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: > I wonder when the last undersea cable was layed? November of last year. -- Will From evan at snarc.net Mon Mar 15 21:40:33 2010 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 22:40:33 -0400 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4B9EEFA1.6070601@snarc.net> Starting bid is $30k for their Apple 1. Not in this economy. --------------------------------------------- > http://shop.ebay.com/earlyapple/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=&_trksid=p4340 > > > > > > From jdbryan at acm.org Mon Mar 15 22:02:47 2010 From: jdbryan at acm.org (J. David Bryan) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:02:47 -0400 Subject: HP 64000 Emulator? In-Reply-To: References: , Message-ID: On Friday, March 12, 2010 at 15:58, Geoff Oltmans wrote: > Real dumb question: does an emulator exist (either through MESS or > similar) for the HP 64000? I am unaware of any. It's not completely clear to me, though, what utility a 64000 emulator would provide. One could run the basic OS and the compilers and linkers, but most of the programs are tied to specific hardware option cards and are disabled (i.e., not even presented as available commands) if the corresponding cards are not installed. For example, the PROM programmer software refuses to run if a PROM card is not present in the station. Are you trying to solve a specific problem? -- Dave From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 15 22:07:45 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 20:07:45 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B9EEBAE.2060501@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4B9D3B78.5070107@tx.rr.com>, <4B9E6C5E.12985.1C919D2@cclist.sydex.com>, <4B9EEBAE.2060501@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4B9E9391.2310.26235BE@cclist.sydex.com> On 15 Mar 2010 at 20:23, Ben wrote: > What other uses do you it for other than candles? > BTW you can now get beeswax & foil capacitors again, fot the audio > freaks. Where you have wood-to-wood contact, such as a drawer slide, it's a great lubricant. There are wood finishes that involve beeswax as a component. Lubricating small taps and dies with it is useful in that it holds the chips, unlike cutting oil. In music, I make my own brass slide lubricant, combining mineral oil, beeswax and anhydrous lanolin (it's non-toxic). There are probably many other uses that I haven't thought of. --Chuck From teoz at neo.rr.com Mon Mar 15 22:10:41 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:10:41 -0400 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4B9EEFA1.6070601@snarc.net> Message-ID: <95B372D803184FFF8A7B8837444C3A8D@dell8300> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Evan Koblentz" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 10:40 PM Subject: Re: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection > Starting bid is $30k for their Apple 1. Not in this economy. > Why, there are plenty of people with tons of money even in this economy (some are even thriving). From geoffr at zipcon.net Mon Mar 15 22:18:58 2010 From: geoffr at zipcon.net (Geoffrey Reed) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 20:18:58 -0700 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <4B9E8584.1000007@gmail.com> Message-ID: On 3/15/10 12:07 PM, "Sridhar Ayengar" wrote: > Ian King wrote: >> I have found such CD-ROM drives to be both plentiful and cheap at local >> second-hand stores. Since they won't work with a PC, they have 'no' >> value.... > > There are many many PC-compatible CD-ROMs that also talk 512-byte > sectors. There might be some in your/his pile already. > >> I have installed the core of VMS and booted from a small-ish drive, but you >> rapidly run out of space. -- Ian > > Is it possible to boot VMS in a small partition in the beginning of a > disk and have another partition elsewhere? I've never had cause to try > this, since I have a giant pile of 500-1000MB disks lying around. > > Peace... Sridhar > Toshiba SCSI cd-roms have jumpers that can be cut to set it to 512 byte blocks, and plextor SCSI cd-rom drives have a jumper for doing so. From jdbryan at acm.org Mon Mar 15 22:21:08 2010 From: jdbryan at acm.org (J. David Bryan) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:21:08 -0400 Subject: More HP microcode & loader rom detective work Message-ID: Jay, On Tue Jul 27 2004 at 09:34, Jay West wrote: > I'm finally digging into my 21MX E-series machines in earnest. In > trying to inventory and document what all I may have, I've found a few > things that stump me and my "docs on hand". Perhaps folks here can shed > some light on these. > > [...] > > Microcode roms I can't identify: > > 93585-80006 > 93585-80007 > 93585-80008 OK, I'm a little late in responding (about six years late :-), but these are the E-Series double-integer firmware instructions (.DAD, .DSB, etc.). They are a product from the HP "specials" group, so they weren't on the regular price list. The relevant HP manual is 93585-90007 at Bitsavers. > 18A0580X012 > 18A0580X022 > 18A0580X032 These are another HP "specials" group product: "93578W Special Pascal Library Subroutines" for the E/F-Series. These are microcoded replacements for the bit-field extract, deposit and indexing run-time function calls emitted by the HP Pascal compiler for access to packed arrays and records. I gather these were used to reduce execution time in Pascal programs. I've not found a manual for these. -- Dave From curt at atarimuseum.com Mon Mar 15 22:22:37 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:22:37 -0400 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4B9EF97D.2010307@atarimuseum.com> I love the blue prints stating "Destroy all Previous Copies" Yet, we all know they weren't destroyed, same with Atari blue prints and schematics, I even have one that says "Do not remove, shred upon reading" and ooops, here it is 30 years later, still intact... Great Apple stuff, I wish I was into Apple Collecting, that is quite the treasure trove, hope somebody has a big stash of cash tucked away... Curt steve wrote: > http://shop.ebay.com/earlyapple/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=&_trksid=p4340 > > > > > > From IanK at vulcan.com Tue Mar 16 00:33:34 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 22:33:34 -0700 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: References: <4B9E8584.1000007@gmail.com>, Message-ID: A lot of old NEC drives have this. I picked one up at a Goodwill for $7 -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Geoffrey Reed [geoffr at zipcon.net] Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 8:18 PM To: cctalk Subject: Re: Booting a VAXstation On 3/15/10 12:07 PM, "Sridhar Ayengar" wrote: > Ian King wrote: >> I have found such CD-ROM drives to be both plentiful and cheap at local >> second-hand stores. Since they won't work with a PC, they have 'no' >> value.... > > There are many many PC-compatible CD-ROMs that also talk 512-byte > sectors. There might be some in your/his pile already. > >> I have installed the core of VMS and booted from a small-ish drive, but you >> rapidly run out of space. -- Ian > > Is it possible to boot VMS in a small partition in the beginning of a > disk and have another partition elsewhere? I've never had cause to try > this, since I have a giant pile of 500-1000MB disks lying around. > > Peace... Sridhar > Toshiba SCSI cd-roms have jumpers that can be cut to set it to 512 byte blocks, and plextor SCSI cd-rom drives have a jumper for doing so. From geoffr at zipcon.net Tue Mar 16 02:57:37 2010 From: geoffr at zipcon.net (Geoffrey Reed) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 00:57:37 -0700 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On 3/15/10 10:33 PM, "Ian King" wrote: > A lot of old NEC drives have this. I picked one up at a Goodwill for $7 -- > Ian > ________________________________________ > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf > Of Geoffrey Reed [geoffr at zipcon.net] > Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 8:18 PM > To: cctalk > Subject: Re: Booting a VAXstation > My favorite is the high speed SCSI plextors :) but the one I have is a burner also. From nigel.d.williams at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 04:12:10 2010 From: nigel.d.williams at gmail.com (Nigel Williams) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:12:10 +1100 Subject: eBay Oz : Collection of DEC Unibus modules including custom wire-wrap Message-ID: <5f2019e51003160212h47bb8727jc5a145bf6cf23a39@mail.gmail.com> All sorts of interesting items: TU-60, CM-11, M792 etc http://shop.ebay.com.au/pdp11.caps11/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1 not connected with seller, however I did purchase fanfold paper-tape from this eBayer. From pcoghlan+cctech at vms.eurokom.ie Tue Mar 16 05:15:07 2010 From: pcoghlan+cctech at vms.eurokom.ie (Peter Coghlan) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 10:15:07 +0000 (WET) Subject: Booting a VAXstation Message-ID: <01NKT9N4B2I0Q34RSW@vms.eurokom.ie> > >> As far as I know you can't boot a traditional VAX from a disk of >> <1GB... but could I put the core of VMS on a small slow narrow SCSI >> disk, like an >> 80MB or something, and put most of it on the only Wide SCSI disk I >> have, a 10GB...? > > You can use a sub-1GB disk to boot from, yes. Booting is, as I >understand it, the only restriction. > Booting is not the only restriction. As far as I know, the same low level drivers in the ROM that are used for booting are also used for writing crashdumps. The problem is that short (6byte?) SCSI commands are used and the addresses wrap back to zero when trying to address parts of the disk beyond the 1.0something GB point. This means that if a dumpfile is located further out than that point on a large disk that VMS has otherwise successfully been installed on, it is possible to end up getting the lower part of the disk overwritten by a crashdump if the system should crash. It is possible to install a minimal VMS configuration on a small disk and access data on a disk larger than 1GB. However, it is difficult to use the larger disk to expand the VMS system as DEC software often wants to be installed on the system disk, ie the one that booted the system. The difficulties can sometimes be overcome but it may take an experienced VMS hacker to do this. I think the best idea is to get something like an RZ26 disk which is around 1GB and use that. It is also possible to boot the 3100 remotely from another VMS system but this is probably not an option here. Regards, Peter Coghlan. From lproven at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 07:47:07 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 12:47:07 +0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003160547i17572e89ye6489a1be44db616@mail.gmail.com> On Mon, Mar 15, 2010 at 6:52 PM, Ian King wrote: >> -----Original Message----- >> From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- >> bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Dave McGuire >> Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 11:28 AM >> To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts >> Subject: Re: Booting a VAXstation >> >> On Mar 15, 2010, at 2:20 PM, Liam Proven wrote: >> > I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely >> > sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI >> > disks of <1GB. >> >> ? ?That machine doesn't have wide SCSI. ?It's 8-bit ("narrow") 10MHz. >> >> > As far as I know you can't boot a traditional VAX from a disk of >> > <1GB... but could I put the core of VMS on a small slow narrow SCSI >> > disk, like an >> > 80MB or something, and put most of it on the only Wide SCSI disk I >> > have, a 10GB...? >> >> ? ?You can use a sub-1GB disk to boot from, yes. ?Booting is, as I >> understand it, the only restriction. >> >> > Also, I have several external SCSI CD-ROMs, including 2 Apple units. >> I >> > seem to recall that VAXen want a weird block size, same as Sun kit... >> > is that correct? How would one tell if a certain drive could do this >> > or not? Is it a DIP switch setting or just a SCSI bus command? >> >> ? ?You need a drive that supports 512-byte blocks. >> >> ? ? ? ? ? -Dave >> > > I have found such CD-ROM drives to be both plentiful and cheap at local second-hand stores. ?Since they won't work with a PC, they have 'no' value.... > > I have installed the core of VMS and booted from a small-ish drive, but you rapidly run out of space. ?-- Ian When you say "a small-ish drive", what counts as "small" for VMS? Or rather, what sort of drive should I be looking for to /not/ have to muck around when installing it? My hope is to get the machine booting into DECwindows. I don't plan to use it as a server, more as sort of glorified X-terminal if anything. -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From lproven at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 07:56:32 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 12:56:32 +0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <4553831056AA4605859E3046129B7A2B@ANTONIOPC> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <4553831056AA4605859E3046129B7A2B@ANTONIOPC> Message-ID: <575131af1003160556y27afab1co444ef1f71f13a076@mail.gmail.com> On Mon, Mar 15, 2010 at 8:44 PM, wrote: > cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org wrote: >> As far as I know you can't boot a traditional VAX from a disk >> of <1GB... but could I put the core of VMS on a small slow >> narrow SCSI disk, like an 80MB or something, and put most of >> it on the only Wide SCSI disk I have, a 10GB...? > > I guess that a VS 3100-38 will happily talk to a wide disk > if you use one of those "50-pin to whatever" converters: > my VS 4K will talk to various 9GB IBM drives with 68-pin > connectors (SCSI-2) and I have had it talk to drives > with SCA connectors too. > > If you can find a console ROM dated later than (iirc) April 1992 > then you can forget about the ~1GB issue. Obviously if you can > find such a ROM, I'm probably not the only one who would be interested > in an image of it :-) I think that's unlikely, unfortunately. Part of the reason I want to brush up my meagre VMS skills is 'cos I am out of work at the moment, and remarkably, I am seeing a few tech support positions out there that want VMS experience. But practically, what this means is: No Money. Ergo, I can't afford to buy any new bits. The reason I got this machine was its extreme cheapness! (Under a pound - for Colonial types, that's about a buck sixty.) >> I was considering either attaching an external SCSI2 disk of >> 80-120GB, or possibly trying to fit one internally if I can >> find an appropriate convertor. I have a fast/wide 8GB or 10GB >> disk I could use for main storage, but I don't think I can >> boot from it... Can I? > > Assuming the old style ROM, you'll have issues. You can do a bunch > of fiddling but it's not easy and it will come back and bite you. > You have to format the drive for ODS-2 and allocate all the space > beyond the 1GB boundary to a disk image file (all this done, presumably > on another machine). Then install OpenVMS and use LDDRIVER to > access the rest of the disk as a logical device (LDA0:). Sounds a bit too much for a 1st-time installer! >> My VMS knowledge is /very/ rusty & I was only ever a >> sysadmin, not a developer. I've never brought up a bare >> system or anything. > > If you stick to a system disk < ~1.073GB (or find a newer ROM) > you'll have no problems. Well, what size of disk would I want? I may have some 500MB units knocking around, possibly bigger. The problem now is finding ones /small/ enough, not big enough! >> Also, I have several external SCSI CD-ROMs, including 2 Apple >> units. I seem to recall that VAXen want a weird block size, >> same as Sun kit... is that correct? How would one tell if a >> certain drive could do this or not? Is it a DIP switch >> setting or just a SCSI bus command? > > VAXen (and Sun boxes) want 512-byte sectors (or, rather, something > that emulates 512-byte sectors). If it boots a bootable OpenVMS > CD then it's comaptible :-) Oh dear. That's the best way to tell? Is there any incantation I can type at the firmware monitor to tell me if it "sees" a device as a CD-ROM? Or is being seen as a CD no guarantee? -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From lproven at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 08:03:40 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 13:03:40 +0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003160603g4bf12685na6ed351129318e51@mail.gmail.com> On Mon, Mar 15, 2010 at 6:28 PM, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 15, 2010, at 2:20 PM, Liam Proven wrote: >> >> I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely >> sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI >> disks of <1GB. > > ?That machine doesn't have wide SCSI. ?It's 8-bit ("narrow") 10MHz. I don't wish to question authority, as it were, but the internal cables are 104 pin (If I'm counting them correctly) and the external SCSI port on the back is 72-pin mini-D. That *looks* like wide SCSI to me! If it's not, then what kind of cabling is it? The ordinary narrow-SCSI stuff I knew from back in the '80s and '90s was 50-way ribbon cables with 50-pin IDC connectors internally and either 50-pin Centronics or D25 connectors externally. >> As far as I know you can't boot a traditional VAX from a disk of >> <1GB... but could I put the core of VMS on a small slow narrow SCSI >> disk, like an >> 80MB or something, and put most of it on the only Wide SCSI disk I >> have, a 10GB...? > > ?You can use a sub-1GB disk to boot from, yes. ?Booting is, as I understand > it, the only restriction. > >> Also, I have several external SCSI CD-ROMs, including 2 Apple units. I >> seem to recall that VAXen want a weird block size, same as Sun kit... >> is that correct? How would one tell if a certain drive could do this >> or not? Is it a DIP switch setting or just a SCSI bus command? > > ?You need a drive that supports 512-byte blocks. Yes, but how do I *tell*, that's the question! -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 08:19:23 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 09:19:23 -0400 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9F855B.2060604@gmail.com> Geoffrey Reed wrote: >> Ian King wrote: >>> I have found such CD-ROM drives to be both plentiful and cheap at local >>> second-hand stores. Since they won't work with a PC, they have 'no' >>> value.... >> >> There are many many PC-compatible CD-ROMs that also talk 512-byte >> sectors. There might be some in your/his pile already. > > Toshiba SCSI cd-roms have jumpers that can be cut to set it to 512 byte > blocks, and plextor SCSI cd-rom drives have a jumper for doing so. And so do many Pioneer drives, and a lot of Sony drives do the right thing when faced with the SCSI command. Peace... Sridhar From oltmansg at bellsouth.net Tue Mar 16 09:50:29 2010 From: oltmansg at bellsouth.net (geoffrey oltmans) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 07:50:29 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Yamaha V9958? In-Reply-To: <4B9F855B.2060604@gmail.com> References: <4B9F855B.2060604@gmail.com> Message-ID: <141978.47988.qm@web83905.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> Does anyone know where you can order one of these (AKA MSX-Video?). Barring that, its earlier cousin the 9938 would be good also. From pcoghlan+cctech at vms.eurokom.ie Tue Mar 16 09:48:28 2010 From: pcoghlan+cctech at vms.eurokom.ie (Peter Coghlan) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 14:48:28 +0000 (WET) Subject: Booting a VAXstation Message-ID: <01NKTJV3PL36Q34RSW@vms.eurokom.ie> > >But practically, what this means is: No Money. Ergo, I can't afford to >buy any new bits. The reason I got this machine was its extreme >cheapness! (Under a pound - for Colonial types, that's about a buck >sixty.) > With any luck it may be possible to scrounge an RZ26 for a similar price to the machine. > >Well, what size of disk would I want? I may have some 500MB units >knocking around, possibly bigger. The problem now is finding ones >/small/ enough, not big enough! > I've managed to crowbar a bootable subset of VMS 5.5-2 into 70MB. It was so long ago I don't remember if this included any Decwindows functionality. More recent versions with more fluff will probably need more. 500MB would certainly be worth a try though. Alternatively, use a disk larger than 1GB and hope for the best. You won't have lost anything if it doesn't work. When doing the install, just install the critical items first, with the hope of having everything that is accessed by the firmware ROMs for boot appear below the 1GB mark. Opt not to have a dumpfile. The biggest problem will probably making sure to get the index file (which is used to locate all the other files on the disk) below the 1GB mark. As far as I recall, VMS places the index file in the middle of the disk by default but this can be overridden when the disk is initialised. The only question is whether this option is available when doing an install from scratch. > >Is there any incantation I can type at the firmware monitor to tell me >if it "sees" a device as a CD-ROM? Or is being seen as a CD no >guarantee? > SHOW DEVICE at the >>> should list the devices on the SCSI bus. I don't think it will tell you if the sector size is correct though. The only way to be sure is to try it. As far as I know, CDs containing a bootable and usable version of VAX/VMS were not produced although they were for Alpha/VMS. A VAX would normally boot the standalone backup program from a CD to do a VMS installation rather than booting directly into VMS from the CD. > >I don't wish to question authority, as it were, but the internal >cables are 104 pin (If I'm counting them correctly) and the external >SCSI port on the back is 72-pin mini-D. That *looks* like wide SCSI to >me! If it's not, then what kind of cabling is it? The ordinary >narrow-SCSI stuff I knew from back in the '80s and '90s was 50-way >ribbon cables with 50-pin IDC connectors internally and either 50-pin >Centronics or D25 connectors externally. > The external SCSI connectors on a 3100 are rather strange. They are a narrow SCSI bus presented on a male 68pin connector. It is definately not wide SCSI even though it looks like it. To use it, the first thing you will need is a cable with a female 68pin connector on one end and a 50 pin centronics type connector (or something else reasonable) on the other. Are there connectors for internal SCSI disks? They should be normal 50pin IDC types. > >Yes, but how do I *tell*, that's the question! > I just picked up an IBM labelled CD drive off the floor. It has a jumper at the back labelled "SECTOR SIZE". It's a fair bet that the two sizes available are 512 and 2048. If you find a drive with a sector size jumper, it will probably do. > >When you say "a small-ish drive", what counts as "small" for VMS? Or >rather, what sort of drive should I be looking for to /not/ have to >muck around when installing it? > 1GB is more than adequate to install VAX/VMS. I remember 3100's used to often come with an RZ23 which I think was 109MB. This was generally regarded as too small to install a useful system on. I would have a go on anything bigger than 200MB. Not having to muck about probably involves spending a little to get an appropriate disk. On the other hand, having to muck about a bit may will give you the experience you are looking for. I'd suggest giving it a go with whatever you have. > >My hope is to get the machine booting into DECwindows. I don't plan to >use it as a server, more as sort of glorified X-terminal if anything. > Recent versions of Decwindows are disk and memory hogs, especially on VAX. It is likely that it will be very slow. It may be wiser to concentrate on terminal based access initially at least. Regards, Peter Coghlan. From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 16 10:31:52 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:31:52 -0400 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003160603g4bf12685na6ed351129318e51@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> <575131af1003160603g4bf12685na6ed351129318e51@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <911A25AC-D631-4A57-BE8B-02711B829F5B@neurotica.com> On Mar 16, 2010, at 9:03 AM, Liam Proven wrote: >>> I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely >>> sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI >>> disks of <1GB. >> >> That machine doesn't have wide SCSI. It's 8-bit ("narrow") 10MHz. > > I don't wish to question authority, as it were, but the internal > cables are 104 pin (If I'm counting them correctly) and the external > SCSI port on the back is 72-pin mini-D. That *looks* like wide SCSI to > me! If it's not, then what kind of cabling is it? The ordinary > narrow-SCSI stuff I knew from back in the '80s and '90s was 50-way > ribbon cables with 50-pin IDC connectors internally and either 50-pin > Centronics or D25 connectors externally. It's 8-bit 10MHz. :) Those machines were designed before the "standard" SCSI connectors were standardized. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From oltmansg at bellsouth.net Tue Mar 16 10:44:24 2010 From: oltmansg at bellsouth.net (geoffrey oltmans) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 08:44:24 -0700 (PDT) Subject: HP 64000 Emulator? In-Reply-To: References: , Message-ID: <273645.34635.qm@web83906.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> I have source code listings in HP64000 assembler format, so I figured maybe that might be a good way to generate binaries from the sources. Are there any assembler tools (Z80 and MC6801 specific) that use HP64000 assembler/linker directives? ________________________________ From: J. David Bryan To: General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only Sent: Mon, March 15, 2010 10:02:47 PM Subject: Re: HP 64000 Emulator? On Friday, March 12, 2010 at 15:58, Geoff Oltmans wrote: > Real dumb question: does an emulator exist (either through MESS or > similar) for the HP 64000? I am unaware of any. It's not completely clear to me, though, what utility a 64000 emulator would provide. One could run the basic OS and the compilers and linkers, but most of the programs are tied to specific hardware option cards and are disabled (i.e., not even presented as available commands) if the corresponding cards are not installed. For example, the PROM programmer software refuses to run if a PROM card is not present in the station. Are you trying to solve a specific problem? -- Dave From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 11:00:12 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 12:00:12 -0400 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <911A25AC-D631-4A57-BE8B-02711B829F5B@neurotica.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> <575131af1003160603g4bf12685na6ed351129318e51@mail.gmail.com> <911A25AC-D631-4A57-BE8B-02711B829F5B@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4B9FAB0C.2010205@gmail.com> Dave McGuire wrote: >>>> I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely >>>> sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI >>>> disks of <1GB. >>> >>> That machine doesn't have wide SCSI. It's 8-bit ("narrow") 10MHz. >> >> I don't wish to question authority, as it were, but the internal >> cables are 104 pin (If I'm counting them correctly) and the external >> SCSI port on the back is 72-pin mini-D. That *looks* like wide SCSI to >> me! If it's not, then what kind of cabling is it? The ordinary >> narrow-SCSI stuff I knew from back in the '80s and '90s was 50-way >> ribbon cables with 50-pin IDC connectors internally and either 50-pin >> Centronics or D25 connectors externally. > > It's 8-bit 10MHz. :) Those machines were designed before the "standard" > SCSI connectors were standardized. These are the machines with that weird HONDA68F connector on the backplate, right? But the internal ribbon cables should be [weird_ribbon_connector]->50-pin IDC, right? Peace... Sridhar From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to Tue Mar 16 11:31:15 2010 From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:31:15 -0500 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E Message-ID: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> I have been interested, of late, in fixing some of the bugs in MACRO.SAV / CREF.SAV which the documentation shows also run under RSTS/E. In addition to fixing the bug so that the year outputs as 4 digits on the listing, I thought it would be interesting to run MACRO.SAV as a system job. This requires a mapped RT-11 monitor to use VBGEXE.SAV to load and initiate MACRO.SAV since it is obviously not an REL file. However, the goal is to still be compatible running under RSTS/E. My question is how to distinguish between a mapped RT-11 monitor and RSTS/E? Does anyone have sufficient information about the RSTS/E environment to be able to distinguish RT-11 from RSTS/E? TSX-PLUS is trivial since requesting the TSX-PLUS job number is not supported under RT-11, so that problem is solved. Jerome Fine From jack.rubin at ameritech.net Tue Mar 16 11:37:29 2010 From: jack.rubin at ameritech.net (Jack Rubin) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 09:37:29 -0700 (PDT) Subject: VAX stuff Message-ID: <193275.46656.qm@web83701.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> This stuff is too new and too big for me - located in Illinois (as per bid site). Note that Craters & Frieghters service is available. Jack ----- Forwarded Message ----- To: "Jack Rubin" Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 3:09:20 PM Subject: RE: old DEC gear Hi We have a couple of items forsale on ibid. A Vax 6620 and a TU81 tapedrive current price $1.00 each Here is the link http://ibid.illinois.gov is is under the electronics section. From woolfson at telswitch.com Tue Mar 16 12:14:24 2010 From: woolfson at telswitch.com (Aaron Woolfson) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 10:14:24 -0700 Subject: Flyback for Monochrome Plato Student Terminal. Message-ID: <001e01cac52c$24a00460$c291a448@aaron> Hi. First time poster. I have a bad flyback transformer on a video board that I've been unable to locate. I've also been unable to find any information about this transformer, or the board that it's on. I have lots of information about what the board is inside of, but nothing on the board itself. It's for a green monochrome Plato Display Terminal, called an AST-1 Student Terminal; even the original designer of the equipment, Jack Stifle at the University of Illinois, does not have any information any more on the video driver board itself. note: The AST-1 Student terminal was supposed to be a lightweight inexpensive replacement for the original Plato IV and Plato V terminals, and was manufactured by the University of Illinois I've been able to find many defails from University of Illinois archives, including all schematics except for the video driver board. The transformer is marked as : VT-521, EIA-528-8521, type sb-1, E36324 I assume EIA 528 means Electronic Industry Association manufacturer 528, with the product (or factory ID) and that's an internal number. The only "cross-reference" is to a SUN microsystems display, but I have ordered that flyback and have found it to be the wrong one... Here are the links to the photos that I've taken of the board: http://customer.telswitch.com/plato/ast001.JPG http://customer.telswitch.com/plato/ast002.JPG The first photo is of the "markings" that the manufacturer must have put on, the second photo is of the actual board itself. The tube that it uses is a Clinton CE745w12h31vrz (which is a standard 745-style tube). Thoughts? Thanks! Aaron From js at cimmeri.com Tue Mar 16 12:19:41 2010 From: js at cimmeri.com (js at cimmeri.com) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 12:19:41 -0500 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4B9FBDAD.3070909@cimmeri.com> > Subject: > Booting a VAXstation > From: > Liam Proven > Date: > Mon, 15 Mar 2010 18:20:19 +0000 > To: > "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" > > To: > "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" > > > I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely > sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI > disks of <1GB. Hi, Liam. First thing to do is find yourself a copy of the manual for the machine as you can do a bunch of stuff with it just from built in diagnostics.. I seem to recall them being out on the web.. possibly here: http://deathrow.vistech.net/~cvisors/DEC94MDS/ I know Antonio Carlini had a site with lots of nice docs too.. but my link is dead. Also check out older posts where people were in the same boat.. such as: http://www.classiccmp.org/pipermail/cctech/2004-December/036556.html My machine came with a TZ30 drive, an RD54 CD, and hard disk all internally... mine's the M48..same as yours but with bigger case. You might need a special cable for the external SCSI.. as its got a funny connector on the computer end. I found one on ebay. For hard drives, I found that I had to experiment with different ones.. not all would work (even if under 1gb). Most did, however. Enjoy, John Singleton From dundas at caltech.edu Tue Mar 16 12:26:03 2010 From: dundas at caltech.edu (John A. Dundas III) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 10:26:03 -0700 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E In-Reply-To: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> References: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> Message-ID: Jerome, At 11:31 AM -0500 3/16/10, Jerome H. Fine wrote: >I have been interested, of late, in fixing some of the bugs in >MACRO.SAV / CREF.SAV >which the documentation shows also run under RSTS/E. Yes, they do. >However, the goal is to still be compatible running under RSTS/E. >My question is >how to distinguish between a mapped RT-11 monitor and RSTS/E? Do you really need to distinguish RSTS? There are a variety of ways to, but the stock MACRO and CREF don't, as far as I know. RSTS looks like an SJ environment to most RT-based programs. >Does anyone >have sufficient information about the RSTS/E environment to be able >to distinguish >RT-11 from RSTS/E? See John From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 16 12:29:48 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 13:29:48 -0400 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <4B9FAB0C.2010205@gmail.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> <575131af1003160603g4bf12685na6ed351129318e51@mail.gmail.com> <911A25AC-D631-4A57-BE8B-02711B829F5B@neurotica.com> <4B9FAB0C.2010205@gmail.com> Message-ID: On Mar 16, 2010, at 12:00 PM, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: >>>>> I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the >>>>> princely >>>>> sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI >>>>> disks of <1GB. >>>> >>>> That machine doesn't have wide SCSI. It's 8-bit ("narrow") 10MHz. >>> >>> I don't wish to question authority, as it were, but the internal >>> cables are 104 pin (If I'm counting them correctly) and the external >>> SCSI port on the back is 72-pin mini-D. That *looks* like wide >>> SCSI to >>> me! If it's not, then what kind of cabling is it? The ordinary >>> narrow-SCSI stuff I knew from back in the '80s and '90s was 50-way >>> ribbon cables with 50-pin IDC connectors internally and either 50- >>> pin >>> Centronics or D25 connectors externally. >> >> It's 8-bit 10MHz. :) Those machines were designed before the >> "standard" >> SCSI connectors were standardized. > > These are the machines with that weird HONDA68F connector on the > backplate, right? But the internal ribbon cables should be > [weird_ribbon_connector]->50-pin IDC, right? That's the one. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 16 12:52:22 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 10:52:22 -0700 Subject: Flyback for Monochrome Plato Student Terminal. In-Reply-To: <001e01cac52c$24a00460$c291a448@aaron> References: <001e01cac52c$24a00460$c291a448@aaron> Message-ID: <4B9F62E6.13790.5DB968@cclist.sydex.com> On 16 Mar 2010 at 10:14, Aaron Woolfson wrote: > I've been able to find many defails from University of Illinois > archives, including all schematics except for the video driver board. > > The transformer is marked as : > VT-521, EIA-528-8521, type sb-1, E36324 Replacement flyback transformers for monochrome displays can be maddeningly difficult to obtain. Your PCB has the appearance of a standard OEM monitor kit, such as produced by the likes of Ball Brothers. You might want to check with some of the specialty outfits that provide service and replacements for industrial equipment, such as CNC controllers to see if they have any ideas. Here's one: http://www.industrial-monitors.com/ --Chuck From IanK at vulcan.com Tue Mar 16 12:51:29 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 10:51:29 -0700 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <4B9FAB0C.2010205@gmail.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <1EC57913-26DC-4B0F-B884-B82E66768CEB@neurotica.com> <575131af1003160603g4bf12685na6ed351129318e51@mail.gmail.com> <911A25AC-D631-4A57-BE8B-02711B829F5B@neurotica.com> <4B9FAB0C.2010205@gmail.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Sridhar Ayengar > Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2010 9:00 AM > To: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Booting a VAXstation > > Dave McGuire wrote: > >>>> I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the > princely > >>>> sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI > >>>> disks of <1GB. > >>> > >>> That machine doesn't have wide SCSI. It's 8-bit ("narrow") 10MHz. > >> > >> I don't wish to question authority, as it were, but the internal > >> cables are 104 pin (If I'm counting them correctly) and the external > >> SCSI port on the back is 72-pin mini-D. That *looks* like wide SCSI > to > >> me! If it's not, then what kind of cabling is it? The ordinary > >> narrow-SCSI stuff I knew from back in the '80s and '90s was 50-way > >> ribbon cables with 50-pin IDC connectors internally and either 50- > pin > >> Centronics or D25 connectors externally. > > > > It's 8-bit 10MHz. :) Those machines were designed before the > "standard" > > SCSI connectors were standardized. > > These are the machines with that weird HONDA68F connector on the > backplate, right? But the internal ribbon cables should be > [weird_ribbon_connector]->50-pin IDC, right? > > Peace... Sridhar That's what mine are. As Sridhar and others have said, that rear connector takes a unique DEC cable. Fortunately, because 3100s were very common, so is the cable. ISTR the only configuration is [weird 68-pin] <--> [Centronics-style 50-pin]. Internally, they are a standard 50-pin IDC to the back of a drive. One problem you may have, though, is that you may be missing the 'sled' that holds the drive in place. This isn't a showstopper, but it does mean you have to ensure that the drive (just sitting in the case) can't short out itself or anything else. I have a machine like that, and I just don't move it. :-) ISTR installing VAX/VMS 7.2 on a 209MB drive. I wasn't trying to do DECwindows, though. -- Ian From Kevin at RawFedDogs.net Tue Mar 16 12:54:47 2010 From: Kevin at RawFedDogs.net (Kevin Monceaux) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 12:54:47 -0500 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003160556y27afab1co444ef1f71f13a076@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <4553831056AA4605859E3046129B7A2B@ANTONIOPC> <575131af1003160556y27afab1co444ef1f71f13a076@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20100316175446.GA46764@RawFedDogs.net> Liam, On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 12:56:32PM +0000, Liam Proven wrote: > I think that's unlikely, unfortunately. Part of the reason I want to brush > up my meagre VMS skills is 'cos I am out of work at the moment, and > remarkably, I am seeing a few tech support positions out there that want > VMS experience. If your main goal is brushing up you VMS skills have you considered running VMS under an emulator on your PC? There's a howto on installing/running VMS under SIMH at: http://www.wherry.com/gadgets/retrocomputing/vax-simh.html Also, I'm not familiar with the details but I think it's possible to install VMS under SIMH and set it up to act as a boot server where you could use it to boot your VAXStation over the network. -- Kevin http://www.RawFedDogs.net http://www.WacoAgilityGroup.org Bruceville, TX Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes. Longum iter est per praecepta, breve et efficax per exempla!!! From ajp166 at verizon.net Tue Mar 16 12:23:35 2010 From: ajp166 at verizon.net (Allison) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 13:23:35 -0400 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <01NKTJV3PL36Q34RSW@vms.eurokom.ie> References: <01NKTJV3PL36Q34RSW@vms.eurokom.ie> Message-ID: <4B9FBE97.6040602@verizon.net> inline.. Peter Coghlan wrote: >> But practically, what this means is: No Money. Ergo, I can't afford to >> buy any new bits. The reason I got this machine was its extreme >> cheapness! (Under a pound - for Colonial types, that's about a buck >> sixty.) >> >> > > With any luck it may be possible to scrounge an RZ26 for a similar > price to the machine. > > Or a scsi baracuda drive in the 1.07gb or smaller range. >> Well, what size of disk would I want? I may have some 500MB units >> knocking around, possibly bigger. The problem now is finding ones >> /small/ enough, not big enough! >> >> > > I've managed to crowbar a bootable subset of VMS 5.5-2 into 70MB. > It was so long ago I don't remember if this included any Decwindows > functionality. More recent versions with more fluff will probably > need more. 500MB would certainly be worth a try though. > > Anything less than 200mb is a force fit. 400mb or larger is comfortable and over 500mb is room rich. FYI those machines can accept typically 2 and often 3 scsi drives inside of the 3.5" form factor. Mine have 1gb for boot drive (dua0) and larger drives for userpace and swap. Even adding a second 50-200mb drive is useful and can be used for swpspace and user space. > Alternatively, use a disk larger than 1GB and hope for the best. > You won't have lost anything if it doesn't work. When doing the > install, just install the critical items first, with the hope > of having everything that is accessed by the firmware ROMs for > boot appear below the 1GB mark. Opt not to have a dumpfile. The > biggest problem will probably making sure to get the index file > (which is used to locate all the other files on the disk) below > the 1GB mark. As far as I recall, VMS places the index file in > the middle of the disk by default but this can be overridden when > the disk is initialised. The only question is whether this option > is available when doing an install from scratch. > > >> Is there any incantation I can type at the firmware monitor to tell me >> if it "sees" a device as a CD-ROM? Or is being seen as a CD no >> guarantee? >> >> > > A lot of the early scsi CD RW drives will do the correct sector size Toshiba and yamaha, I forget the one that begins with P (plextor?). > SHOW DEVICE at the >>> should list the devices on the SCSI bus. I don't > think it will tell you if the sector size is correct though. The only > way to be sure is to try it. > > As far as I know, CDs containing a bootable and usable version of VAX/VMS > were not produced although they were for Alpha/VMS. A VAX would normally > boot the standalone backup program from a CD to do a VMS installation > rather than booting directly into VMS from the CD. > > >> I don't wish to question authority, as it were, but the internal >> cables are 104 pin (If I'm counting them correctly) and the external >> SCSI port on the back is 72-pin mini-D. That *looks* like wide SCSI to >> me! If it's not, then what kind of cabling is it? The ordinary >> narrow-SCSI stuff I knew from back in the '80s and '90s was 50-way >> ribbon cables with 50-pin IDC connectors internally and either 50-pin >> Centronics or D25 connectors externally. >> >> > > The external SCSI connectors on a 3100 are rather strange. They are a > narrow SCSI bus presented on a male 68pin connector. It is definately not > wide SCSI even though it looks like it. To use it, the first thing you > will need is a cable with a female 68pin connector on one end and a 50 pin > centronics type connector (or something else reasonable) on the other. > > I have multiple 3100s and yes the connectors are weird and the internal ones are the nominal 50 pin. > Are there connectors for internal SCSI disks? They should be normal > 50pin IDC types. > > >> Yes, but how do I *tell*, that's the question! >> >> > > I just picked up an IBM labelled CD drive off the floor. It has a > jumper at the back labelled "SECTOR SIZE". It's a fair bet that the > two sizes available are 512 and 2048. If you find a drive with a > sector size jumper, it will probably do. > > >> When you say "a small-ish drive", what counts as "small" for VMS? Or >> rather, what sort of drive should I be looking for to /not/ have to >> muck around when installing it? >> >> > > 1GB is more than adequate to install VAX/VMS. I remember 3100's used > to often come with an RZ23 which I think was 109MB. This was generally > regarded as too small to install a useful system on. I would have > a go on anything bigger than 200MB. > A drive of 500mB for versions through 7.3 (by my expericnce) is more than enough room. >Not having to muck about probably involves spending a little to get > an appropriate disk. On the other hand, having to muck about a bit > may will give you the experience you are looking for. > > I'd suggest giving it a go with whatever you have. > > >> My hope is to get the machine booting into DECwindows. I don't plan to >> use it as a server, more as sort of glorified X-terminal if anything. >> >> > > Recent versions of Decwindows are disk and memory hogs, especially on > VAX. It is likely that it will be very slow. It may be wiser to > concentrate on terminal based access initially at least. > > define slow! ;) Depending on version and other things it may appear more responsive than many would believe. Do not expect a cpu that is many times faster than a 1993 486/33 to beat a PIII anything. However you may find that line oriented text apps to be decent. Allison > Regards, > Peter Coghlan. > > From roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk Tue Mar 16 14:16:43 2010 From: roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk (Roger Holmes) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 19:16:43 +0000 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <8FE4CD15-F808-47C9-B616-2EDEEF78E8BF@microspot.co.uk> On 16 Mar 2010, at 03:10, cctalk-request at classiccmp.org wrote: > > Message: 14 > Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 21:44:49 -0000 > From: "Andrew Burton" > Subject: Re: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > Message-ID: <005201cac490$8be1db90$f0fdf93e at user8459cef6fa> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Teo Zenios" > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 10:25 PM > Subject: Re: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) > > >> I gave up drinking cola with caffeine and now mostly drink 7-up with >> artificial sweeteners (you end up getting a sweet tooth late in the day). >> >> I used to guzzle mountain dew in the morning when I worked and I found if > I >> didn't my mind would be a little cloudy until I did so I gave it up. >> >> Yes, you do lose a bunch of weight when switching to diet pop, but you > gain >> it back slowly when you get a craving for sweets (you body doesn'y like to >> be fooled by fake sweetener). > > > You can say that again (the bit in brackets in the last sentence). If I > drink Diet Cola it makes me sick, as in regurgitating what I ate recently. > So I stay well away from diet drinks... but I have a few other allergies too > (hayfever, asthma, eczema and certain plastics cause irration to my skin > after contact for 5-10 minutes). I suppose I should count myself lucky that > I'm not allergic to sunlight. I'm very sorry to hear that. Two things you might like to consider. Is the Diet Coke in a plastic botttle, and if so is the plasticiser getting into the drink? Of course if you have the same reaction to it in a glass bottle then thats not it. Is it the Aspartame sweetener? Its nasty stuff, affects the pancreas, particularly for diabetics and some experts even think the 'diabetes epidemic' is caused by it. My 87 year old mother had type one diabetes (controlled with tablets). They told her to cut down her sugar intake, so I started to go through what I buy online every week and found lower sugar versions. Coke -> Diet Coke and Robinsons Orange -> No Added Sugar Robinsons Orange etc. Soon her daily sugar measurements were off the scale, the gauge only reads up to about 25 beyond that it just says high. The medics gradually increased her tablets, switched to injecting insulin, saying now it was type 2 diabetes, the dosage went up to 74 units per day. Then one of the 'carers' (who was not medically trained) told me some of her other clients had cut out Diet Coke and become much better. I was sceptical so asked one of the nurses and though she did not want to say so on the record she suggested I cut down my mothers consumption of Aspartame. I've been doing that though some things like orange squash all seem to have it in. Now the medics are gradually reducing her insulin and frequently have to give her chocolate in the morning to get her sugar level UP to four so that they can give her her insulin without causing her to have a fit when they administer it. Try googling Aspartame Diabetes for what one doctor says about it. On the original topic, when I programmed in microcode assembler then assembler and Coral66 then Pascal I drank Ribena : result all my molars have huge fillings which might cause a blip in the mercury price when they need to be replaced :-) Now I program in C++ and have switched to Rose's lime. Of course outside work its bitter ale, either Shepherd Neame Masterbrew or when I'm in London Courage Directors. I can see the site of the old Fremlin's brewery out of my office window, thats the beer from which the word gremlin derive's its name. When I'm finding logic faults on my ICT1301 mainframe its cloudy lemonade and McVities Digestives (plain ones, not chocolate ones) to make up for skipping lunch. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 16 15:06:06 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:06:06 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B9EC4E3.3000207@gmail.com> from "Jules Richardson" at Mar 15, 10 06:38:11 pm Message-ID: > I don't know - having seen your place, I can imagine you having some kind of You've seen a very small part of it ;-) > launch vehicle in there somewhere. Possibly under a pile of other things, and > you've forgotten that you have it... ;-) Err, no. All i have is a satellite simulator, and I know where that is. This is not a joke. I have a box of electroniucs that was controlled by a PDP11/10 that was dersigned to simulate the behaviour of a small part of a satellite's electrical system so as to test an experiment that was flown in said satellite. It's a 6U crate of boards (quite simple) and a couple of DEC connector blcoks contianing flip-chip cards (there's certainly an M105 address decocer in there) for the Unibus interface. Oh, IO also have the trays of paper tape software for it. > >> It's a shame about the magazine, though -- they published some pretty=20 > >> neat projects, all of which could be built from parts available from=20 > > > > Indeed. I built many of them over the years. I rememebr watching > > commetical for NICAM televisions using the Maplin NICAM tuner/decoder kit > > and a greenscreen monitor :-) > > I remember drooling over that nicam hardware back in the day. That and the Z80 > based home weather station. There are some projects I regret not having built while they were still avaialbe. The telephone exchange is one (alas it had a programmed EPROM fro the number decoding, so recreating it would be non-trivial). The weather satellite receiver/decoder is another (alas the receiver came a pre-built PCBm which is what rather put ne off building it). As I mentioned, the modem was another. Oh well, too late now... > > I gave up Circuit Cellar and then Elektor when they both became 'yet > > another microcontroller project' magazines. As you well know, I have > > nothing against microcontrollers, but I don't think they're the _only_ > > solution. > > There's just something... boring about them, somehow. And I know I shouldn't Exactly. I'd like to solder up a big board ot TTL once in a while :-). Tge problem with Circuit Cellar is that every project seemd to use a different microcotnroller. But the time you'd built/bought programmers for all for all of them and learnt the applicaable languages, you'd have not time or space to do anything else :-) > think like that, because they're not so different to a lot of the 8-bit stuff > that I grew up with. Tjhe main difference for me is that in general the program store address and data buses are not accessible (Ues, I am well aware that come microcontrollers can be run with extranl program memory, but an lot can't). Which means my methods of debugging machien code -- that is using a logic analyser hooked up to said buses -- is impossible. Trying to get soemthing working when you can't investigate the behaviour of a major subsystem is not pleasant. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 16 15:09:53 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:09:53 +0000 (GMT) Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <4B9EE2A5.6070505@oldskool.org> from "Jim Leonard" at Mar 15, 10 08:45:09 pm Message-ID: > > 2)If the colours are wrong but consistent, can't you modify them after > > digitising them? > > Not easily. It's an analog capture and there are luma/chroma cross-talk > issues that make things worse. I would only do that if desperate, and > it still wouldn't look right. What are you really trying to do? Waht is the machine you are taking the outputs from, and what are you trying to do with them? > > > 3) Take a look at the CGA monitor schematic, particularly the part from > > the RGBI TTL inputs to the CRT cathodes. This will show you how the 4 TTL > > signals are combined to produce analogue RGB signals. > > I would need to go to school to understand what I would be looking at. Err, I didn't. For the record I have never had a single formal class in any form of electronicvs. I am pretty darn certain that this can't be done with a simple cable, and it can't be done properly with passive components. You are going to need some simple chips to do this. The input stage of a CGA monitor will kelp (and will show you how colour 6 is handled), but you will need to make modifications. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 16 15:26:47 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:26:47 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Flyback for Monochrome Plato Student Terminal. In-Reply-To: <001e01cac52c$24a00460$c291a448@aaron> from "Aaron Woolfson" at Mar 16, 10 10:14:24 am Message-ID: > > Hi. First time poster. Welcome to the list :-) > > I have a bad flyback transformer on a video board that I've been unable = > to locate. I've also been unable to find any information about this = > transformer, or the board that it's on. I have lots of information = > about what the board is inside of, but nothing on the board itself. > > It's for a green monochrome Plato Display Terminal, called an AST-1 = > Student Terminal; even the original designer of the equipment, Jack = > Stifle at the University of Illinois, does not have any information any = > more on the video driver board itself. note: The AST-1 Student terminal = > was supposed to be a lightweight inexpensive replacement for the = > original Plato IV and Plato V terminals, and was manufactured by the = > University of Illinois=20 > > I've been able to find many defails from University of Illinois = > archives, including all schematics except for the video driver board. My guess is the the video boartd was a standard product at the time, and was bought-in, not designed by said university. Are there any useful markings on the board itself? What is the input connector? aAny ideas as to the scan rates? Incidentally, why do you think the flyback transformer is faulty? -tony From lynchaj at yahoo.com Tue Mar 16 16:36:39 2010 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 17:36:39 -0400 Subject: Yamaha V9958? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <62ABFCEFB2094560BD174CF339E0D3C9@andrewdesktop> > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of geoffrey oltmans > Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2010 10:50 AM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Yamaha V9958? > > Does anyone know where you can order one of these (AKA MSX-Video?). > Barring that, its earlier cousin the 9938 would be good also. [AJL>] Hi! On the N8VEM project we are getting ready to release a TMS9918/AY-3-8910 Sprite Color Graphic and Sound (SCGS) board. The board is basically done and awaiting the PCB trace route optimization to complete before ordering manufactured PCBs. There are also plans for a follow on V9938 board. V9958 has "issues" that make it less desirable than the V9938 IMO especially since it cannot generate composite video. It can generate RGB video though and has some enhanced scrolling ability. None of these chips can generate VGA compatible video though so be fore warned. http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com/browse/#view=ViewFolder¶m=Color%2520Graphic s%2520and%2520Sound http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com/browse/#view=ViewFolder¶m=SCGS As always, constructive comments welcome; send flames and pointless criticisms to /dev/null We've had some luck procuring the chips from leemoom611 on eBay. I've bought several chips now (TMS9918, TMS99118, V9938, V9958) without issue. Seems like a decent guy but I can't say much other than it worked for me. I have no business connections with him other than a satisfied customer. You are welcome to join us on the N8VEM project if you are interested in a TMS9918 or V9938/V9958 home brew computer project or whatever you'd like to do. Regardless, I wish you the best of luck with your project. Please keep us (me?) posted on your progress. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 16 17:02:48 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 15:02:48 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: <4B9EC4E3.3000207@gmail.com> from "Jules Richardson" at Mar 15, 10 06:38:11 pm, Message-ID: <4B9F9D98.23540.1430174@cclist.sydex.com> On 16 Mar 2010 at 20:06, Tony Duell wrote: > Tjhe main difference for me is that in general the program store > address and data buses are not accessible (Ues, I am well aware that > come microcontrollers can be run with extranl program memory, but an > lot can't). Which means my methods of debugging machien code -- that > is using a logic analyser hooked up to said buses -- is impossible. > Trying to get soemthing working when you can't investigate the > behaviour of a major subsystem is not pleasant. Many, if not most, microcontrollers (but for the very tiny ones) have some sort of on-chip (e.g. JTAG) debugging facility. Given that everything else is on-chip, why would you want to monitor the internal bus signals, even if you could? --CHuck From oltmansg at bellsouth.net Tue Mar 16 17:02:50 2010 From: oltmansg at bellsouth.net (geoffrey oltmans) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 15:02:50 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Yamaha V9958? In-Reply-To: <62ABFCEFB2094560BD174CF339E0D3C9@andrewdesktop> References: <62ABFCEFB2094560BD174CF339E0D3C9@andrewdesktop> Message-ID: <326176.38255.qm@web83909.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> Thanks for the tip... figures I wouldn't try eBay for that. ;) I was actually wanting one as an upgrade for my Coleco ADAM. I had installed a TIM board with the 9938 in one back in the day, and wrote some initialization software for it. Was thinking about building my own board to do the same again. ________________________________ From: Andrew Lynch To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Sent: Tue, March 16, 2010 4:36:39 PM Subject: RE: Yamaha V9958? > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of geoffrey oltmans > Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2010 10:50 AM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Yamaha V9958? > > Does anyone know where you can order one of these (AKA MSX-Video?). > Barring that, its earlier cousin the 9938 would be good also. [AJL>] Hi! On the N8VEM project we are getting ready to release a TMS9918/AY-3-8910 Sprite Color Graphic and Sound (SCGS) board. The board is basically done and awaiting the PCB trace route optimization to complete before ordering manufactured PCBs. There are also plans for a follow on V9938 board. V9958 has "issues" that make it less desirable than the V9938 IMO especially since it cannot generate composite video. It can generate RGB video though and has some enhanced scrolling ability. None of these chips can generate VGA compatible video though so be fore warned. http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com/browse/#view=ViewFolder¶m=Color%2520Graphic s%2520and%2520Sound http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com/browse/#view=ViewFolder¶m=SCGS As always, constructive comments welcome; send flames and pointless criticisms to /dev/null We've had some luck procuring the chips from leemoom611 on eBay. I've bought several chips now (TMS9918, TMS99118, V9938, V9958) without issue. Seems like a decent guy but I can't say much other than it worked for me. I have no business connections with him other than a satisfied customer. You are welcome to join us on the N8VEM project if you are interested in a TMS9918 or V9938/V9958 home brew computer project or whatever you'd like to do. Regardless, I wish you the best of luck with your project. Please keep us (me?) posted on your progress. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch From arcarlini at iee.org Tue Mar 16 17:28:31 2010 From: arcarlini at iee.org (arcarlini at iee.org) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:28:31 -0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003160547i17572e89ye6489a1be44db616@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6891377B68C040238CAC9EF40B72B7B2@ANTONIOPC> > When you say "a small-ish drive", what counts as "small" for > VMS? Or rather, what sort of drive should I be looking for to > /not/ have to muck around when installing it? > > My hope is to get the machine booting into DECwindows. I > don't plan to use it as a server, more as sort of glorified > X-terminal if anything. I used to have VMS (V5.5, V6) + DECnet-Plus on an RD54 (157MB). I would say that 300MB or so is comfortable for VMS + DECW + a bunch of layered products. You can always hang an additional disk (> 1GB) on there for data. Antonio From arcarlini at iee.org Tue Mar 16 17:30:01 2010 From: arcarlini at iee.org (arcarlini at iee.org) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:30:01 -0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003160556y27afab1co444ef1f71f13a076@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: >> VAXen (and Sun boxes) want 512-byte sectors (or, rather, something >> that emulates 512-byte sectors). If it boots a bootable OpenVMS CD >> then it's comaptible :-) > > Oh dear. That's the best way to tell? > > Is there any incantation I can type at the firmware monitor > to tell me if it "sees" a device as a CD-ROM? Or is being > seen as a CD no guarantee? SHOW DEVICE will tell you what it sees on the bus, but that's probably just whatever shows up in the SCSI ID. It's probably not until you try to boot that an incompatibility would show up. Antonio From arcarlini at iee.org Tue Mar 16 17:32:05 2010 From: arcarlini at iee.org (arcarlini at iee.org) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:32:05 -0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003160603g4bf12685na6ed351129318e51@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <146105AE8F6F48A5AE7E85F63599C94F@ANTONIOPC> > I don't wish to question authority, as it were, but the > internal cables are 104 pin (If I'm counting them correctly) > and the external SCSI port on the back is 72-pin mini-D. That > *looks* like wide SCSI to me! If it's not, then what kind of > cabling is it? The ordinary narrow-SCSI stuff I knew from > back in the '80s and '90s was 50-way ribbon cables with > 50-pin IDC connectors internally and either 50-pin Centronics or D25 > connectors externally. The VS3100s all take 50-pin SCSI-1 disks. The internal cabling depends on the exact model but all three styles of VS3100 use 50-pin disks. You can get 68-pin SCSI-2 disks to work with an adapter (usually). Antonio From arcarlini at iee.org Tue Mar 16 17:33:30 2010 From: arcarlini at iee.org (arcarlini at iee.org) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:33:30 -0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <4B9FBDAD.3070909@cimmeri.com> Message-ID: >I know Antonio Carlini had a site with lots of nice docs too.. but my >link is dead. I'm still here but I never had a site. Were you thinking of Manx perhaps? http://vt100.net/manx No longer maintained (I believe) but still extremely useful. Antonio From lproven at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 17:35:05 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:35:05 +0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <20100316175446.GA46764@RawFedDogs.net> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <4553831056AA4605859E3046129B7A2B@ANTONIOPC> <575131af1003160556y27afab1co444ef1f71f13a076@mail.gmail.com> <20100316175446.GA46764@RawFedDogs.net> Message-ID: <575131af1003161535k2aadd509pa39aeddc12be806c@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 5:54 PM, Kevin Monceaux wrote: > Liam, > > On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 12:56:32PM +0000, Liam Proven wrote: > >> I think that's unlikely, unfortunately. Part of the reason I want to brush >> up my meagre VMS skills is 'cos I am out of work at the moment, and >> remarkably, I am seeing a few tech support positions out there that want >> VMS experience. > > If your main goal is brushing up you VMS skills have you considered running > VMS under an emulator on your PC? ?There's a howto on installing/running VMS > under SIMH at: > > http://www.wherry.com/gadgets/retrocomputing/vax-simh.html > > Also, I'm not familiar with the details but I think it's possible to install > VMS under SIMH and set it up to act as a boot server where you could use it > to boot your VAXStation over the network. > > > > -- > > Kevin > http://www.RawFedDogs.net > http://www.WacoAgilityGroup.org > Bruceville, TX > > Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes. > Longum iter est per praecepta, breve et efficax per exempla!!! That's a good point - thanks for the idea. I had thought that one way to go might be to get SIMH running and net-boot the VAXstation off that, if I couldn't find a suitable CD-ROM. But meantime, this might be my best bet for now. So after a few hours' fiddling, I now have OpenVMS 7.3 installed on a SIMH VAX under Ubuntu 9.10 (64-bit)! This has been rather entertaining The snag is, although I have an ancient hobbyist CD, I don't have a licence & the UK user group doesn't seem to do free memberships. I've emailed their VMS chap to ask how I might proceed... Many thanks for the reminder! I do at least feel that I am on the way now, but it's not the same as the real thing, is it? :?) -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 16 17:41:48 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 18:41:48 -0400 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mar 16, 2010, at 6:30 PM, wrote: >>> VAXen (and Sun boxes) want 512-byte sectors (or, rather, something >>> that emulates 512-byte sectors). If it boots a bootable OpenVMS CD >>> then it's comaptible :-) >> >> Oh dear. That's the best way to tell? >> >> Is there any incantation I can type at the firmware monitor >> to tell me if it "sees" a device as a CD-ROM? Or is being >> seen as a CD no guarantee? > > SHOW DEVICE will tell you what it sees on the bus, but that's > probably just whatever shows up in the SCSI ID. It's probably > not until you try to boot that an incompatibility would show up. Well the device inquiry SCSI command doesn't involve a block number, so yes, this would be correct. The limitation is the number of bits in the SCSI CDB that are used to represent logical block numbers. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From lproven at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 18:08:24 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:08:24 +0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <4B9FBDAD.3070909@cimmeri.com> References: <4B9FBDAD.3070909@cimmeri.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003161608tb718a44y6ea7e9652f3fc35b@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 5:19 PM, js at cimmeri.com wrote: > > Subject: > Booting a VAXstation > From: > Liam Proven > Date: > Mon, 15 Mar 2010 18:20:19 +0000 > To: > "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" > To: > "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" > > I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely > sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI > disks of <1GB. > > Hi, Liam. > > ? First thing to do is find yourself a copy of the manual for the machine as you can do a bunch of stuff with it just from built in diagnostics..?? I seem to recall them being out on the web.. possibly here: > > ?http://deathrow.vistech.net/~cvisors/DEC94MDS/ Thanks for the tip. I did actually get the original owners' manual with this machine - and a couple of mice, a keyboard & a 17" mono screen. Just no disks/sleds/cables or anything. :?( > > I know Antonio Carlini had a site with lots of nice docs too.. but my link is dead. > > Also check out older posts where people were in the same boat.. such as: > > http://www.classiccmp.org/pipermail/cctech/2004-December/036556.html Very helpful... thanks! > My machine came with a TZ30 drive, an RD54 CD, and hard disk all internally... mine's the M48..same as yours but with bigger case. > > You might need a special cable for the external SCSI.. as its got a funny connector on the computer end.? I found one on ebay. I might be able to improvise one - I have a lot of SCSI cables. I used to run a lot of SCSI kit, although almost none is left now. A whole pile of it went to a collector off this very list, in fact... (Hi, Rod!) > For hard drives, I found that I had to experiment with different ones.. not all would work (even if under 1gb).?? Most did, however. > > Enjoy, > ? John Singleton It will be a learning experience! -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From glen.slick at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 18:25:35 2010 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 16:25:35 -0700 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003161608tb718a44y6ea7e9652f3fc35b@mail.gmail.com> References: <4B9FBDAD.3070909@cimmeri.com> <575131af1003161608tb718a44y6ea7e9652f3fc35b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e91003161625o2e19d819g2d9133b400e0495b@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 4:08 PM, Liam Proven wrote: >> You might need a special cable for the external SCSI.. as its got a funny connector on the computer end.? I found one on ebay. > > I might be able to improvise one - I have a lot of SCSI cables. I used > to run a lot of SCSI kit, although almost none is left now. A whole > pile of it went to a collector off this very list, in fact... (Hi, > Rod!) > http://antinode.info/dec/vs3100_scsi.html BC56H (also 17-02008-01 straight 50-pin) BC09J (also 17-02443-01 right angle 50-pin) example: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140333879294 I should pick up one of these myself for a 3100-M76 I recently acquired. I'm also missing the internal SCSI terminator, P/N 12-33816-01 I believe. Anyone know where to find one of those? I could probably build a short adapter cable to plug in a standard external SCSI terminator on to the end of the internal SCSI cable harness. From lproven at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 18:34:07 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:34:07 +0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e91003161625o2e19d819g2d9133b400e0495b@mail.gmail.com> References: <4B9FBDAD.3070909@cimmeri.com> <575131af1003161608tb718a44y6ea7e9652f3fc35b@mail.gmail.com> <1e1fc3e91003161625o2e19d819g2d9133b400e0495b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003161634o17d72d57q8a6316a6e0826014@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 11:25 PM, Glen Slick wrote: > On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 4:08 PM, Liam Proven wrote: > >>> You might need a special cable for the external SCSI.. as its got a funny connector on the computer end.? I found one on ebay. >> >> I might be able to improvise one - I have a lot of SCSI cables. I used >> to run a lot of SCSI kit, although almost none is left now. A whole >> pile of it went to a collector off this very list, in fact... (Hi, >> Rod!) >> > > http://antinode.info/dec/vs3100_scsi.html > > BC56H (also 17-02008-01 straight 50-pin) > BC09J (also 17-02443-01 right angle 50-pin) > > example: > http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140333879294 Thanks. Sadly, as the listing says: ? WE DO NOT SHIP INTERNATIONALLY!!! ? Not very helpful of them, but that is quite common with US companies, especially since the USPS stopped offering surface post. That crippled one of my favourite sites, www.bookmooch.com So does it need to be that DEC-specific cable? Nothing else uses that size of external SCSI connector, or is the wiring nonstandard? And what kind of cable do I need to attach 50-pin SCSI drives internally to the SCSI card's 104-pin connector? -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From RichA at vulcan.com Tue Mar 16 18:31:44 2010 From: RichA at vulcan.com (Rich Alderson) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 16:31:44 -0700 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003161535k2aadd509pa39aeddc12be806c@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <4553831056AA4605859E3046129B7A2B@ANTONIOPC> <575131af1003160556y27afab1co444ef1f71f13a076@mail.gmail.com> <20100316175446.GA46764@RawFedDogs.net> <575131af1003161535k2aadd509pa39aeddc12be806c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: From: Liam Proven Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2010 3:35 PM > So after a few hours' fiddling, I now have OpenVMS 7.3 installed on a > SIMH VAX under Ubuntu 9.10 (64-bit)! This has been rather entertaining > The snag is, although I have an ancient hobbyist CD, I don't have a > licence & the UK user group doesn't seem to do free memberships. I've > emailed their VMS chap to ask how I might proceed... Membership in the US chapter is free even for the international set. Go to http://www.decuserve.org for details. Rich Alderson Vintage Computing Sr. Server Engineer Vulcan, Inc. 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 Seattle, WA 98104 mailto:RichA at vulcan.com mailto:RichA at LivingComputerMuseum.org http://www.PDPplanet.org/ http://www.LivingComputerMuseum.org/ From lproven at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 18:58:16 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:58:16 +0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <4553831056AA4605859E3046129B7A2B@ANTONIOPC> <575131af1003160556y27afab1co444ef1f71f13a076@mail.gmail.com> <20100316175446.GA46764@RawFedDogs.net> <575131af1003161535k2aadd509pa39aeddc12be806c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003161658o7f514dd8wd1776456c83c2d00@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 11:31 PM, Rich Alderson wrote: > From: Liam Proven > Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2010 3:35 PM > >> So after a few hours' fiddling, I now have OpenVMS 7.3 installed on a >> SIMH VAX under Ubuntu 9.10 (64-bit)! This has been rather entertaining > >> The snag is, although I have an ancient hobbyist CD, I don't have a >> licence & the UK user group doesn't seem to do free memberships. I've >> emailed their VMS chap to ask how I might proceed... > > Membership in the US chapter is free even for the international set. ?Go to > http://www.decuserve.org for details. > > > Rich Alderson > Vintage Computing Sr. Server Engineer > Vulcan, Inc. > 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 > Seattle, WA 98104 > > mailto:RichA at vulcan.com > mailto:RichA at LivingComputerMuseum.org > > http://www.PDPplanet.org/ > http://www.LivingComputerMuseum.org/ Wonderful! Many thanks. The registration process alone was nostalgic! -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From glen.slick at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 19:00:06 2010 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 17:00:06 -0700 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003161634o17d72d57q8a6316a6e0826014@mail.gmail.com> References: <4B9FBDAD.3070909@cimmeri.com> <575131af1003161608tb718a44y6ea7e9652f3fc35b@mail.gmail.com> <1e1fc3e91003161625o2e19d819g2d9133b400e0495b@mail.gmail.com> <575131af1003161634o17d72d57q8a6316a6e0826014@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e91003161700kd084212nd95d533eeb4093dc@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 4:34 PM, Liam Proven wrote: > > So does it need to be that DEC-specific cable? Nothing else uses that > size of external SCSI connector, or is the wiring nonstandard? > > And what kind of cable do I need to attach 50-pin SCSI drives > internally to the SCSI card's 104-pin connector? > Everything I've read on the net indicates that the 3100 external SCSI cable is non-standard so your best bet would be to try to acquire an original DEC cable. Are you missing the internal SCSI harness as well? For a Model 38 from looking at the online manuals I believe you would want a 17-02439-01 Internal SCSI-A bus data cable. Found that part number in this manual. Don't take my word that is the correct part since I don't have a Model 38 to check myself. VAXstation 3100 Maintenance Guide Addendum Models 38 & 48 Order Number EK-344AA-AD-001 If that is the correct part number and it is what you need and you can't find it anywhere else, they are listed at http://www.jtcomputer.com for $25 and their website says the ship international. They also list the BC56H-03 there for $10, and I'll probably by one from them myself. From lynchaj at yahoo.com Tue Mar 16 19:12:00 2010 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:12:00 -0400 Subject: Yamaha V9958? Message-ID: <96A48E00C96B4625BE9ECC8109F21DDC@andrewdesktop> Thanks for the tip... figures I wouldn't try eBay for that. ;) I was actually wanting one as an upgrade for my Coleco ADAM. I had installed a TIM board with the 9938 in one back in the day, and wrote some initialization software for it. Was thinking about building my own board to do the same again. -----REPLY---- Hi! The Coleco ADAM is a Z80 computer right? If you are up to some experimenting the other related item at the N8VEM that might be interesting to you is the PropIO. Using a shim socket, the PropIO can be interfaced to the Z80 CPU socket. Then with proper software support it can provide PS/2 keyboard, VGA, and microSD for your computer. Assuming of course the ADAM design is compatible. Basically if the ADAM can access an IO port it should work fine but the best way to be sure is to check the schematic. One of the N8VEM builders has done some experimenting on a Kaypro and a SpectraVideo 728 with the Z80 shim socket to PropIO and it worked fine in both cases. It might be a neat expansion option for you if you are interested. I am looking for some hardware experimenters to test the system out on some various Z80 computers. I am not aware of anything like it for the ADAM but don't follow it too closely either. If you are interested (or anyone else) please let me know. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch PS, the PropIO shim socket approach *should* work for any of the N8VEM expansion boards so if you are interested in expanding your Z80 computer or adding peripherals to your Z80 home brew computer this might be helpful to you since you won't need to reinvent it. It could add simple interfaces such as IDE/FDC (DiskIO) or Zilog Peripherals (CTC, DART, dual PIO) as well as the PropIO. From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to Tue Mar 16 20:04:22 2010 From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:04:22 -0500 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E In-Reply-To: References: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> Message-ID: <4BA02A96.9040101@compsys.to> >John A. Dundas III wrote: > Do you really need to distinguish RSTS? There are a variety of ways > to, but the stock MACRO and CREF don't, as far as I know. RSTS looks > like an SJ environment to most RT-based programs. You are correct. The problem is when VBGEXE.SAV is used under a mapped RT-11 monitor (RT11XM) to load and initiate MACRO.SAV, especially for a system job. If RSTS/E looks like an SJ environment, then it should provide that information to an RT-11 request to determine if a mapped monitor is being used. That will be PERFECT since the problems can occur ONLY with a mapped RT-11 monitor. Can anyone verify that the CONFG2 (location 300 offset) word will show an unmapped monitor? This is extremely easy to verify. Assuming that an RT-11 distribution is available, an attempt to: SW RT11 RUN VBGEXE.SAV under RSTS/E will generate the error message that a mapped monitor is required as the very first bit of code that is executed if RSTS/E looks like a SJ monitor as far as any RT-11 program is concerned. VBGEXE.SAV is available with all RT-11 distributions starting with V05.01 of RT-11. Probably the best distribution to use is V05.03 of RT-11 which is available at: http://www.classiccmp.org/PDP-11/RT-11/dists/ There will still be the problem of extracting VBGEXE.SAV and placing the file into the RSTS/E environment. But anyone running RSTS/E under an emulator should have very little difficulty in that regard. If you run into any problems, I can probably help. > See > > > > > John Thank you again. I lost track of this file which you told me about almost a year ago. I hope that the file will provide the information. Jerome Fine From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Tue Mar 16 20:45:36 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:45:36 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC Message-ID: You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab Graphics like Dr. Halo Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal http://vetusware.com Randy _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail is redefining busy with tools for the New Busy. Get more from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_2 From evan at snarc.net Tue Mar 16 20:53:42 2010 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:53:42 -0400 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA03626.90104@snarc.net> What, you're saying the owner of that site thinks the copyrights of Windows, AutoCAD, Matlab, and Mathmatica are in question? These programs are not abandonware. They are pirated. I'm just sayin'.... --------------------------------------------- > > You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. > > All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 > Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab > Graphics like Dr. Halo > Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal > > > http://vetusware.com > > Randy > > _________________________________________________________________ > Hotmail is redefining busy with tools for the New Busy. Get more from your inbox. > http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_2 > From healyzh at aracnet.com Tue Mar 16 21:56:11 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 18:56:11 -0800 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Sounds more like pirated software than abandonware. Most of those are products from some very active, and very big companies. Zane At 8:45 PM -0500 3/16/10, Randy Dawson wrote: >You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. > >All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 >Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab >Graphics like Dr. Halo >Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal > > >http://vetusware.com > >Randy -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 ggs at shiresoft.com Tue Mar 16 20:58:26 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 18:58:26 -0700 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA03626.90104@snarc.net> References: <4BA03626.90104@snarc.net> Message-ID: Beat me to it! :-) ...and I know *all* about Mathmatica *not* being abandonware (what ever that means). I purchased a copy for home and for work recently. TTFN - Guy On Mar 16, 2010, at 6:53 PM, Evan Koblentz wrote: > What, you're saying the owner of that site thinks the copyrights of Windows, AutoCAD, Matlab, and Mathmatica are in question? > > These programs are not abandonware. They are pirated. > > I'm just sayin'.... > > --------------------------------------------- >> >> You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. >> >> All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 >> Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab >> Graphics like Dr. Halo >> Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal >> >> >> http://vetusware.com >> >> Randy >> >> _________________________________________________________________ >> Hotmail is redefining busy with tools for the New Busy. Get more from your inbox. >> http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_2 >> > From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 16 21:20:32 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 19:20:32 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. > All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 > Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab > Graphics like Dr. Halo > Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal > http://vetusware.com There is NO abandonware anywhere on that site. EVERYTHING there is illegal copies for piracy. Those of us who make a living writing software do not condone unauthorized distribution of copyrighted works. From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Tue Mar 16 21:26:13 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:26:13 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: , Message-ID: Zane, I see lots of stuff there that are definitely pretty dead. Also not sure how badly the others are going to run you down for grabbing an obsolete product. Lattice C for example, Lattice is definitely out of business, as well as Digital Research. Microsoft has put MASM in the public domain quite a while ago. I know, your going to tell me the rights were purchased by some other company in the chain, so go review the SCO/Novel debacle. We can always find plenty of lawyers here in the USA to argue over copyrights. I am not aware of any hobbyist with no comercial gain being bit by these tactics. Anybody here, that blows some eproms from binaries on the web to bring a machine back to life is probably also in violation of copyright. Reminds me of the Compaq bios, the reason it worked, is IBM apps peeked into the bios locations for the "Copyright IBM' string, and if found, executed. The Compaq guys put that string in the exact same location, but it was "None of this code is Copyright IBM" Randy > Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 18:56:11 -0800 > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > From: healyzh at aracnet.com > Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > > Sounds more like pirated software than abandonware. Most of those > are products from some very active, and very big companies. > > Zane > > > > At 8:45 PM -0500 3/16/10, Randy Dawson wrote: > >You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. > > > >All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 > >Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab > >Graphics like Dr. Halo > >Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal > > > > > >http://vetusware.com > > > >Randy > > -- > | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | > | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | > | | 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/ | _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail has tools for the New Busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_1 From brain at jbrain.com Tue Mar 16 21:29:36 2010 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:29:36 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA03E90.7060808@jbrain.com> On 3/16/2010 9:20 PM, Fred Cisin wrote: > On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > >> You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. >> All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 >> Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab >> Graphics like Dr. Halo >> Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal >> http://vetusware.com >> I thought it was a troll (Using Autocad and "abandonware" in the same sentence). I'd clean up your "cookies" files and such if you visited, as it might have been a trap :-) Jim From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Tue Mar 16 21:34:11 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:34:11 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> References: , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: Er, Fred, I write software too, I wrote the first ever multimedia program for the PC in DOS and Windows, the roller coster simulator COASTER. (realtime fractal video decompression, with audio) First months sales $240,000, in 1994 Outsold Lotus 123. So don't put me in the 'those of you', I'm in the those of us. Randy > Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 19:20:32 -0700 > From: cisin at xenosoft.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > > On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > > You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. > > All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 > > Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab > > Graphics like Dr. Halo > > Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal > > http://vetusware.com > > There is NO abandonware anywhere on that site. EVERYTHING there is > illegal copies for piracy. > > Those of us who make a living writing software do not condone unauthorized > distribution of copyrighted works. _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail has tools for the New Busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_1 From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 16 21:39:27 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:39:27 -0400 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA03626.90104@snarc.net> References: <4BA03626.90104@snarc.net> Message-ID: <3AC95621-38E2-4F4F-BBE7-84774F68A8F6@neurotica.com> On Mar 16, 2010, at 9:53 PM, Evan Koblentz wrote: > What, you're saying the owner of that site thinks the copyrights of > Windows, AutoCAD, Matlab, and Mathmatica are in question? > > These programs are not abandonware. They are pirated. *click* Hmm, that's funny. *click* *click* They download just fine. *click* Must not be a problem. *click* *click* -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From jfoust at threedee.com Tue Mar 16 21:52:28 2010 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:52:28 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <3AC95621-38E2-4F4F-BBE7-84774F68A8F6@neurotica.com> References: <4BA03626.90104@snarc.net> <3AC95621-38E2-4F4F-BBE7-84774F68A8F6@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <201003170252.o2H2qmOJ092654@billY.EZWIND.NET> At 09:39 PM 3/16/2010, Dave McGuire wrote: > Hmm, that's funny. *click* *click* > They download just fine. *click* > Must not be a problem. *click* *click* You didn't register, did you? - John From trixter at oldskool.org Tue Mar 16 21:54:26 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:54:26 -0500 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA04462.7030106@oldskool.org> On 3/16/2010 3:09 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > What are you really trying to do? Waht is the machine you are taking the > outputs from, and what are you trying to do with them? Trying to capture the output of a program running on an IBM 5160 that only looks correct via CGA RGB output. >> I would need to go to school to understand what I would be looking at. > > Err, I didn't. For the record I have never had a single formal class in > any form of electronicvs. For the record, you are one of a kind. I say that with the sincerest form of flattery. Had I enough free time, I could learn it too, but I don't have much these days. My free time in my youth was spent learning the hardware from the outside (ie. assembler programming), not the inside. > I am pretty darn certain that this can't be done with a simple cable, and > it can't be done properly with passive components. You are going to need > some simple chips to do this. > The input stage of a CGA monitor will kelp (and will show you how colour > 6 is handled), but you will need to make modifications. Fair enough; I'll retain this to show my electronics-savvy brother. -- 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 mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 16 21:55:35 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:55:35 -0400 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <201003170252.o2H2qmOJ092654@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <4BA03626.90104@snarc.net> <3AC95621-38E2-4F4F-BBE7-84774F68A8F6@neurotica.com> <201003170252.o2H2qmOJ092654@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: On Mar 16, 2010, at 10:52 PM, John Foust wrote: >> Hmm, that's funny. *click* *click* >> They download just fine. *click* >> Must not be a problem. *click* *click* > > You didn't register, did you? No. Actually I didn't even go there tonight. I found that site about four years ago, and downloaded pretty much everything I wanted. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From trixter at oldskool.org Tue Mar 16 21:56:12 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:56:12 -0500 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> Collector's items or not, even considering the source, some of those starting bids are simple too high. Very curious to see what these will go for, if at all. On 3/15/2010 9:33 PM, steve wrote: > > http://shop.ebay.com/earlyapple/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=&_trksid=p4340 > > > > > -- 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 healyzh at aracnet.com Tue Mar 16 23:04:26 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:04:26 -0800 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> Message-ID: I see a couple items there that I'd be interested in, but no way am I spending that kind of money on anything like that! Zane At 9:56 PM -0500 3/16/10, Jim Leonard wrote: >Collector's items or not, even considering the source, some of those >starting bids are simple too high. Very curious to see what these >will go for, if at all. > >On 3/15/2010 9:33 PM, steve wrote: >> >>http://shop.ebay.com/earlyapple/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=&_trksid=p4340 -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 trixter at oldskool.org Tue Mar 16 22:05:16 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:05:16 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA046EC.8090903@oldskool.org> On 3/16/2010 9:20 PM, Fred Cisin wrote: > There is NO abandonware anywhere on that site. EVERYTHING there is > illegal copies for piracy. Undeniably. Abandonware is one of the most horrible terms I had the unfortunate history of helping coin. I was part of the original movement and lobbied very heavily to call "software no longer made available in any form by the publisher" by the term "oldwarez". Unfortunately I lost, and the horrid term "abandonware" was chosen. I'm not going to get into a discussion about pirating software with those who do it for a living. We pirate software every time we get our old computers running (ie. you didn't really pay for that 30-yr-old operating system, did you?) so such a discussion would be hypocritical. But I *will* say that some of us in the old-game-pirating movement knew full well what we were doing. It's unfortunate that the morons who were trying to kid themselves that what they were doing was somehow moral outnumbered us when it came time to pick a name. -- 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 Mar 16 22:06:24 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:06:24 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: , Message-ID: <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > I see lots of stuff there that are definitely pretty dead. Also not > sure how badly the others are going to run you down for grabbing an > obsolete product. Lattice C for example, Lattice is definitely out of > business, as well as Digital Research. Microsoft has put MASM in the > public domain quite a while ago. Not true. You can not provide a document that relinquishes ther copyright of it. > I know, your going to tell me the rights were purchased by some other > company in the chain, so go review the SCO/Novel debacle. We can always > find plenty of lawyers here in the USA to argue over copyrights. I am > not aware of any hobbyist with no comercial gain being bit by these > tactics. There is NO argument possible to the explicit transfer of IP rights. From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 16 22:11:16 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:11:16 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> > > There is NO abandonware anywhere on that site. EVERYTHING there is > > illegal copies for piracy. > > Those of us who make a living writing software do not condone unauthorized > > distribution of copyrighted works. On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > Er, Fred, > I write software too, I wrote the first ever multimedia program for the PC in DOS and Windows, the roller coster simulator COASTER. (realtime fractal video decompression, with audio) > First months sales $240,000, in 1994 > Outsold Lotus 123. > So don't put me in the 'those of you', > I'm in the those of us. So, you DO condone unauthorized distribution of your copyrighted works? My work becomes public domain when _I_ transfer it to public domain, NOT when some asshole finds out that I've moved since first release, and he can't find me in 10 minutes of searching, or decides that I'm not going to come after him. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred From trixter at oldskool.org Tue Mar 16 22:12:25 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:12:25 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA04899.6050100@oldskool.org> On 3/16/2010 9:34 PM, Randy Dawson wrote: > > I write software too, I wrote the first ever multimedia program for the PC in DOS and Windows, the roller coster simulator COASTER. (realtime fractal video decompression, with audio) Absolutely positively NOT the first multimedia program for the PC. I'm sure you are proud of your creation, but there are many examples of prior art by several years. Sherlock Holmes in 1991 comes to mind, or if you're a stickler for "PC *and* Windows" then Jones in the Fast Lane in 1992 has you beat with both versions on the same CDROM. I am limiting my comments to motion video on a CDROM -- there are prior examples of motion video (with sync'd audio) that came on multiple floppy disks, if you want to get even more pedantic :-) > Outsold Lotus 123. Well, that wasn't hard to do in 1994, considering that quattro was trouncing it in DOS and Excel was trouncing it in Windows at that time. But hey, you get props for using fractal video in DOS. I'm being serious. What were the system requirements for the DOS version for playback? -- 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 mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 16 22:18:05 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:18:05 -0400 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> Message-ID: <06A7BDAD-3C2D-4AD8-85F4-B7A3DB5F60D3@neurotica.com> On Mar 17, 2010, at 12:04 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > I see a couple items there that I'd be interested in, but no way am > I spending that kind of money on anything like that! I've never seen the general attitude of classiccmp summed up so succinctly. ;) -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 22:18:03 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:18:03 -0400 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> Message-ID: > Collector's items or not, even considering the source, some of those > starting bids are simple too high. ?Very curious to see what these will go > for, if at all. Putting top-shelf items up on Ebay with huge starting bids is a well known (and quite effective) way of showing the world what is up for sale. Even if nothing sells, it is very cheap advertising. -- Will From wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 22:23:46 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:23:46 -0400 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA03626.90104@snarc.net> References: <4BA03626.90104@snarc.net> Message-ID: > These programs are not abandonware. ?They are pirated. And if our long lost list leader finds out that you are advertising a warez site, he is going to chuck your balls into a woodchipper. -- Will From jfoust at threedee.com Tue Mar 16 22:24:32 2010 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:24:32 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <201003170325.o2H3Ov2H094016@billY.EZWIND.NET> At 10:06 PM 3/16/2010, Fred Cisin wrote: >There is NO argument possible to the explicit transfer of IP rights. Do you mean company-to-company, or do you mean licenses, and adherence to shrinkwrap agreements? If the agreement says you can't transfer ownership, then how can a collector even acquire someone else's old stuff? - John From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 16 22:33:30 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:33:30 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <201003170325.o2H3Ov2H094016@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> <201003170325.o2H3Ov2H094016@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <20100316202819.B70534@shell.lmi.net> > >There is NO argument possible to the explicit transfer of IP rights. On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, John Foust wrote: > Do you mean company-to-company, or do you mean licenses, and adherence > to shrinkwrap agreements? > If the agreement says you can't transfer ownership, then how > can a collector even acquire someone else's old stuff? I'm referring to the ownership of the copyright of the work. There are, indeed, some questions of the legality of "adhesion contracts", such as shrinkwrap agreements, and even some issues on transfer of ownership of a licensed copy. Placing a work on a site for anonymous download without the consent of the owner of the copyright is certainly NOT a "gray area". -- Grumpy Ol' Fred From healyzh at aracnet.com Tue Mar 16 23:37:59 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:37:59 -0800 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: <06A7BDAD-3C2D-4AD8-85F4-B7A3DB5F60D3@neurotica.com> References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> <06A7BDAD-3C2D-4AD8-85F4-B7A3DB5F60D3@neurotica.com> Message-ID: At 11:18 PM -0400 3/16/10, Dave McGuire wrote: >On Mar 17, 2010, at 12:04 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >>I see a couple items there that I'd be interested in, but no way am >>I spending that kind of money on anything like that! > > I've never seen the general attitude of classiccmp summed up so >succinctly. ;) There was a time when I would have considered bidding on at least one of the items. Now I'm trying to do a massive shrink of my own collection, and the money I used to spend on Classic Computers is now targeted for more realistic things. The disturbing thing is, while I'm trying to get rid of most of my collection I'm in the middle of my biggest (and best) Commodore haul ever. It is free, and slowly being delivered from out of state. Oh, well, I said I was keeping a lot of the Commodore stuff. :-) Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 trixter at oldskool.org Tue Mar 16 22:43:17 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:43:17 -0500 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> Message-ID: <4BA04FD5.70803@oldskool.org> On 3/16/2010 10:18 PM, William Donzelli wrote: >> Collector's items or not, even considering the source, some of those >> starting bids are simple too high. Very curious to see what these will go >> for, if at all. > > Putting top-shelf items up on Ebay with huge starting bids is a well > known (and quite effective) way of showing the world what is up for > sale. Even if nothing sells, it is very cheap advertising. I had not considered that! -- 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 bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Mar 16 22:49:12 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:49:12 -0600 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> References: , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA05138.5090605@jetnet.ab.ca> Fred Cisin wrote: > My work becomes public domain when _I_ transfer it to public domain, NOT > when some asshole finds out that I've moved since first release, and he > can't find me in 10 minutes of searching, or decides that I'm not going to > come after him. The real abondonware is see that a great small product is bought out like say Micro-$ and you are left with product that needs a few bug fixes or drivers to update,or buy meg-a-$$$ product from Micro-$ with now improved features that is still a few revisions behind the product you were using. > -- > Grumpy Ol' Fred > Ben. PS. The same could more be said about PC clones --- where do find leagle software. PPS. Is there a FORTRAN IV for DOS that is free? From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 16 22:57:03 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:57:03 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA04899.6050100@oldskool.org> References: , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> <4BA04899.6050100@oldskool.org> Message-ID: <20100316205330.O70534@shell.lmi.net> > On 3/16/2010 9:34 PM, Randy Dawson wrote: > > I write software too, I wrote the first ever multimedia program for the PC in DOS and Windows, the roller coster simulator COASTER. (realtime fractal video decompression, with audio) On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Jim Leonard wrote: > Absolutely positively NOT the first multimedia program for the PC. I'm > sure you are proud of your creation, but there are many examples of > prior art by several years. Sherlock Holmes in 1991 comes to mind, or > if you're a stickler for "PC *and* Windows" then Jones in the Fast Lane > in 1992 has you beat with both versions on the same CDROM. I saw some crappy demos of multimedia programs for the PC in 1986. But, If Randy wants to state that his was BETTER than all that came before his, then I don't have an argument. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred From jfoust at threedee.com Tue Mar 16 22:59:09 2010 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:59:09 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100316202819.B70534@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> <201003170325.o2H3Ov2H094016@billY.EZWIND.NET> <20100316202819.B70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <201003170401.o2H40uCE096393@billY.EZWIND.NET> At 10:33 PM 3/16/2010, Fred Cisin wrote: >There are, indeed, some questions of the legality of "adhesion contracts", >such as shrinkwrap agreements, and even some issues on transfer of >ownership of a licensed copy. >Placing a work on a site for anonymous download without the consent of the >owner of the copyright is certainly NOT a "gray area". Perhaps something like the legal concept of adverse possession will arise in the software world. If the original owner isn't actively pursuing violations, perhaps the IP rights could be turned over to some other party who did preserve it and does show an interest in it. In my case, I actively developed a product for a decade. In 1997 I sold it to another company, who plowed it under in less than two years. That company itself was bought, sold, split, merged a few times since then. I can't even find anyone within the company who will return my calls or emails, much less be able to admit with any certainty what happened to the source, who has it, and whether they'd turn the rights back to me. Buying the IP does give you the right to bury it under a rock. I hope there's a significant fraction of software developers who would be tickled to hear their old stuff is still being appreciated. I suspect many would be glad to give it away. - John From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Tue Mar 16 23:03:35 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:03:35 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> References: , , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: Absolutely Fred, let em copy my old stuff, and have fun, enjoy the title. There is no practical way for us authors of anything that old to extract any bucks from it. When I was hot with my title, I enjoyed the ride, but come on, move on. Any software on that abandonware site has long lost any commercial viability, support or availability from the original manufacturers. I'll correct my previous post, MASM is not in the public domain, but freely downloadable from Microsoft. Your code is long dead too, in fact you report the software discontinued on your xenosoft site, and sales suspended while you work on other projects. Put it out there for the kiddies, with source, teach them something before you die. I'll get flames on this I'm sure, but old code has been out of the can for as long as the internet and BBS existence. If you cant make money on it, let the old stuff go. Or better yet, let your energies be directed somewhere else, stop worrying about your title on the net, because there is nothing you can do about it anyway. Other subject, Mr. Donzelli, I was not advertising a site, I just ran across it and found it interesting, as others here have reported being there 4 years ago and downloaded all they wanted. And Mr. Leonard, WRONG, my title was the first video decompression to run at full frame rates on the PC, in both DOS and Windows. The CD ROM stuff never worked well, the data rate was too slow. MPEG2 was just arriving, and you could get a hardware card to support it. My stuff was bumped up off the hard drive into EMM and decompressed on the fly, no added hardware, with a task switch that kept the buffer loaded. Fractal compression was the only way at the time, it took specialized hardware in FPGA days to create the compression files, but the decompress was lightning fast. As far as hardware requirements, I supported the latest Cirrus Logic video cards in mode 13, 32k colors. In addition to all that engineering, the roller coaster models were true simulations of the actual rides, with support from the amusement parks. They were procedurally modeled with the ride geometry derived from the original blueprints, and I wrote the 3d simulation for the acceleration and quaternion rotation of the camera along the track. The rendering was done in the commercial system TOPAS on the PC, with animation and model scripts generated from the track data. Randy > Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:11:16 -0700 > From: cisin at xenosoft.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: RE: great abandonware for your classic PC > > > > There is NO abandonware anywhere on that site. EVERYTHING there is > > > illegal copies for piracy. > > > Those of us who make a living writing software do not condone unauthorized > > > distribution of copyrighted works. > > On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > > Er, Fred, > > I write software too, I wrote the first ever multimedia program for the PC in DOS and Windows, the roller coster simulator COASTER. (realtime fractal video decompression, with audio) > > First months sales $240,000, in 1994 > > Outsold Lotus 123. > > So don't put me in the 'those of you', > > I'm in the those of us. > > So, you DO condone unauthorized distribution of your copyrighted works? > > > My work becomes public domain when _I_ transfer it to public domain, NOT > when some asshole finds out that I've moved since first release, and he > can't find me in 10 minutes of searching, or decides that I'm not going to > come after him. > > > -- > Grumpy Ol' Fred _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail is redefining busy with tools for the New Busy. Get more from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_2 From jdbryan at acm.org Tue Mar 16 23:14:32 2010 From: jdbryan at acm.org (J. David Bryan) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 00:14:32 -0400 Subject: HP 64000 Emulator? In-Reply-To: <273645.34635.qm@web83906.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> References: , , <273645.34635.qm@web83906.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Tuesday, March 16, 2010 at 8:44, geoffrey oltmans wrote: > I have source code listings in HP64000 assembler format, so I figured > maybe that might be a good way to generate binaries from the sources. Wouldn't that just move the problem one step farther away? The 64000 assembler produces binaries in HP 64000 relocatable format, which, as far as I know, isn't used by any other system. The 64000 linker reads relocatables produced by the assembler, but then it produces an HP 64000 absolute format file. There were a few non-HP systems that would read 64000 absolute -- the Data I/O 29B programmer comes to mind -- but I doubt that anything contemporary does. > Are there any assembler tools (Z80 and MC6801 specific) that use > HP64000 assembler/linker directives? I'm not aware of any. However, the 64000 used a fairly small set of assembler directives, and they're documented in the manuals for the processors in question. The 6801 manual is HP number 64841-90905, which is available on Bitsavers. I don't see a Z80 manual there, though I suspect that many of the directives would be cross-platform. It may be a relatively simple matter to translate the 64000-specific directives into ones for a cross-assembler that runs on contemporary hardware. -- Dave From trixter at oldskool.org Tue Mar 16 23:16:55 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:16:55 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <201003170401.o2H40uCE096393@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> <201003170325.o2H3Ov2H094016@billY.EZWIND.NET> <20100316202819.B70534@shell.lmi.net> <201003170401.o2H40uCE096393@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <4BA057B7.2020506@oldskool.org> On 3/16/2010 10:59 PM, John Foust wrote: > I hope there's a significant fraction of software developers who would > be tickled to hear their old stuff is still being appreciated. I suspect > many would be glad to give it away. I have had great reactions from everyone I've contacted regarding their old works -- in fact, I recommend people try it. Some examples: - Neal White III and Rand E. Bohrer gave me some great previously-unknown information about their work when I interviewed them for an article ( http://www.mobygames.com/featured_article/feature,10/ ). - Paul Carruthers was so tickled when I told him the true story that I was able to complete all 100 designed levels of Archipelagos (levels past 100 are seed-generated) that he sent me a free copy of Archipelagos 2000, released only in the UK. - The person who did the PC port of Jumpman, when asked questions about it for a reverse-engineering project ( http://www.oldskool.org/pc/jumpman ), was kind enough to send as much of the original code as he could find to the project to help out. - Mark Pelczarski of Pengiun Software/Polarware was kind enough to send me the asm code for Graphics Magician when I was trying to write a util to display graphics created by that program. It's only the lawyers (who weren't even BORN when the original works came out) that don't give two shits. In my experience, anyway. Geez, I sound old. I'm not even 40 yet. -- 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 wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 23:17:19 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 00:17:19 -0400 Subject: Flyback for Monochrome Plato Student Terminal. In-Reply-To: <001e01cac52c$24a00460$c291a448@aaron> References: <001e01cac52c$24a00460$c291a448@aaron> Message-ID: > It's for a green monochrome Plato Display Terminal, called an AST-1 Student Terminal; Is it a CDC 722-31? -- Will From jfoust at threedee.com Tue Mar 16 23:21:12 2010 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:21:12 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <201003170421.o2H4LSQC097250@billY.EZWIND.NET> At 11:03 PM 3/16/2010, Randy Dawson wrote: >I'll get flames on this I'm sure, but old code has been out of the can for as long as the internet and BBS existence. If you cant make money on it, let the old stuff go. Or better yet, let your energies be directed somewhere else, stop worrying about your title on the net, because there is nothing you can do about it anyway. Really? :-) At 04:06 PM 3/10/2007, Randy Dawson wrote: >I have Stardent (Kubota) Dore' running today and porting my old app to it. >I wrote the PC roller coaster simulator, COASTER. I want to re-spin it, now that fast GPU hardware has finaly arrived and in every PC. So you're handing out the source to the old one, but writing a new one? - John From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 16 23:24:31 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:24:31 -0700 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> References: , , <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4B9FF70F.22401.B6210@cclist.sydex.com> On 16 Mar 2010 at 20:06, Fred Cisin wrote: > There is NO argument possible to the explicit transfer of IP rights. Current US copyright is 95 years post mortem auctoris or 95 years after publication for works still in copyright in 1978 (WTO URAA). I don't think there was much software written before 1923, but I could be mistaken. So you have some time to wait. Ask any musician about copyright and "abandonware". There are publishers that have in their libraries scores that have been out of print for 50 years with no intention of resurrecting them. Those same firms will sue you for distributing copies that you've made yourself. You don't like it, get the law changed. I'm all for copyrights to have the same terms and protections as patents. --Chuck From trixter at oldskool.org Tue Mar 16 23:35:10 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:35:10 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: , , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA05BFE.1010501@oldskool.org> On 3/16/2010 11:03 PM, Randy Dawson wrote: > > And Mr. Leonard, WRONG, my title was the first video decompression to run at full frame rates on the PC, in both DOS and Windows. The CD ROM stuff never worked well, the data rate was too slow. MPEG2 was just arriving, and you could get a hardware card to support it. My stuff was bumped up off the hard drive into EMM and decompressed on the fly, no added hardware, with a task switch that kept the buffer loaded. Fractal compression was the only way at the time, it took specialized hardware in FPGA days to create the compression files, but the decompress was lightning fast. As far as hardware requirements, I supported the latest Cirrus Logic video cards in mode 13, 32k colors. Well, you needed to be more specific when you said MULTIMEDIA -- that can mean anything. I still think I can find prior art. What res were your videos? What framerate? (and just for my own curiosity, what class hardware was needed to decompress -- 486? Pentium?) Would I impress you if I said I developed a system that played back 30fps color video with sound -- in CGA -- on a 4.77MHz 8088 -- requiring only 128K of RAM? In 16 colors with an effective resolution of 320x200? And wasn't lying? http://www.oldskool.org/pc/8088_Corruption if you're curious. > In addition to all that engineering, the roller coaster models were true simulations of the actual rides, with support from the amusement parks. They were procedurally modeled with the ride geometry derived from the original blueprints, and I wrote the 3d simulation for the acceleration and quaternion rotation of the camera along the track. The rendering was done in the commercial system TOPAS on the PC, with animation and model scripts generated from the track data. THAT is truly impressive, as well as your use of FPGAs to encode the video. You do get mad props for that (I'm completely serious). But you can't claim "first multimedia program on PC". That is just too wild and vague a statement, especially since you're not defining what "multimedia" is. -- 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 IanK at vulcan.com Tue Mar 16 23:39:53 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:39:53 -0700 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA046EC.8090903@oldskool.org> References: <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> <4BA046EC.8090903@oldskool.org> Message-ID: >-----Original Message----- >From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- >bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Jim Leonard >Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2010 8:05 PM >To: General at mail.mobygames.com; Discussion@ >Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > >On 3/16/2010 9:20 PM, Fred Cisin wrote: >> There is NO abandonware anywhere on that site. EVERYTHING there is >> illegal copies for piracy. > >Undeniably. > >Abandonware is one of the most horrible terms I had the unfortunate >history of helping coin. I was part of the original movement and >lobbied very heavily to call "software no longer made available in any >form by the publisher" by the term "oldwarez". Unfortunately I lost, >and the horrid term "abandonware" was chosen. > >I'm not going to get into a discussion about pirating software with >those who do it for a living. We pirate software every time we get our >old computers running (ie. you didn't really pay for that 30-yr-old >operating system, did you?) so such a discussion would be hypocritical. Yes, we did pay - or at least in kind. I spent months negotiating with a certain large corporation for rights to run their software, even thought it would have been trivial for me to simply install it from vintage media (that I possessed). The software in question is certainly obsolete, but there is no question that they own the rights to it. In other cases, it's hard to figure out who owns the rights - we're currently working with some folks on just such issues. The degree of difficulty does not justify 'assuming' a faux doctrine such as 'abandonware'. Yes, I too have worked in roles that made money from intellectual property: software and music. It's funny how it changes your perspective. Michael Jackson is still dead, but I read just today about a new business deal being negotiated about his music. Death is the ultimate abandonment - but the intellectual property rights live on. Is it 'right' or 'just'? Sorry, I gave up swallowing camels and straining at gnats years ago. I do know that wishing doesn't make it so, and wishing away others' IP rights, regardless of coming up with a clever moniker, is no guarantee that some lawyer somewhere isn't going to put his next child through college on your tab. -- Ian From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 16 23:51:43 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 21:51:43 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4B9FF70F.22401.B6210@cclist.sydex.com> References: , , <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> <4B9FF70F.22401.B6210@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20100316213514.Y70534@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Chuck Guzis wrote: > Current US copyright is 95 years post mortem auctoris or 95 years > after publication for works still in copyright in 1978 (WTO URAA). I > don't think there was much software written before 1923, but I could > be mistaken. > So you have some time to wait. And sometimes, the IP ownership of stuff LONG GONE is still extremely valuable. If Adam Osborne had acted promptly enough to obtain a share of the Visicalc IP from any of the multiple heirs to it (at one point, $10K would have bought it), he would have been more than invincible to Lotus. When Novel bought Digital Research, it was not for any tangible assets, other than the copyright for CP/M, and the power that that had to keep MICROS~1 at bay. > Ask any musician about copyright and "abandonware". There are > publishers that have in their libraries scores that have been out of > print for 50 years with no intention of resurrecting them. Those > same firms will sue you for distributing copies that you've made > yourself. The situation of music and software copyrights are quite similar. The lack of effective use of a copyright doesn't diminish the ownership of it. "Abandonware" doesn't exist unless there are no heirs to the IP. In fact, in some cases multiple entities can have enforceable rights. (such as Visicalc, or even the Seattle Computer Products non-exclusive right to "the operating system") It's also worth noticing that sometimes the copyright is held by the PUBLISHER, not the AUTHOR. Does Sheb Wooley still get any royalties for his share of what little money still comes in from "One Eyed One Horn Flying Purple People Eater"? -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Mar 16 23:58:25 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:58:25 -0600 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100316213514.Y70534@shell.lmi.net> References: , , <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> <4B9FF70F.22401.B6210@cclist.sydex.com> <20100316213514.Y70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA06171.1050101@jetnet.ab.ca> Fred Cisin wrote: > > It's also worth noticing that sometimes the copyright is held by the > PUBLISHER, not the AUTHOR. Does Sheb Wooley still get any royalties for > his share of what little money still comes in from "One Eyed One Horn > Flying Purple People Eater"? What surprized me is the "Happy birthday" song is still copywright. I think it is the same song, but sometimes you never know just what a song is named. > -- > Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com > PS: I think I like "Does your chewing gum lose its ..." better. From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 17 00:12:55 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:12:55 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA06171.1050101@jetnet.ab.ca> References: , , <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> <4B9FF70F.22401.B6210@cclist.sydex.com> <20100316213514.Y70534@shell.lmi.net> <4BA06171.1050101@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <20100316221200.R70534@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Ben wrote: > What surprized me is the "Happy birthday" song is still copywright. > I think it is the same song, but sometimes you never know just what > a song is named. That one is a pretty good argument for a shorter term for copyright! From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Wed Mar 17 00:14:13 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 00:14:13 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <201003170421.o2H4LSQC097250@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <201003170421.o2H4LSQC097250@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: > Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:21:12 -0500 > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > From: jfoust at threedee.com > Subject: RE: great abandonware for your classic PC > > At 11:03 PM 3/16/2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > >I'll get flames on this I'm sure, but old code has been out of the can for as long as the internet and BBS existence. If you cant make money on it, let the old stuff go. Or better yet, let your energies be directed somewhere else, stop worrying about your title on the net, because there is nothing you can do about it anyway. > > > Really? :-) > > At 04:06 PM 3/10/2007, Randy Dawson wrote: > >I have Stardent (Kubota) Dore' running today and porting my old app to it. > >I wrote the PC roller coaster simulator, COASTER. I want to re-spin it, now that fast GPU hardware has finaly arrived and in every PC. > > So you're handing out the source to the old one, but writing a new one? > > - John > Sure, and more than that, post the new beside the changes, with details of lessons learned. As Jim Leonard said, us developers are more than happy to talk about the design challenges and how we solved them. I had many cool tricks to do real time on the PC, and could write a chapter on it. Most of the code we all write are what I call 'tiny circuits', little nuggets that perform some cool logic thing. One tiny module hooks to another and performs something all together different and cool. In my case, I would be glad to show the code, and talk about it for: Calculating the acceleration, and accumulating the velocity based on the slope of track segments (Euler integration) Determining the camera view matrix from the 3d model as you ride the coaster (some smart guys from the NASA dynamics group gave me the shuttle fortran for quaternion to 3d rotation matrix) circular list of EMM pointers, of the next block to load, the next block to play, based on the PC timer I had limited space, 13 disks, so I looped the audio, for the coaster chain, the screams and coaster sound, picking up the appropriate track segment to associate the sound samples. My intro to each coaster, was a cad animation of the ride geometry constructing, I used a file of Tek 1410 vectors and a simple parser to read and do the cad drawing, rather than have the model in memory, and a 3d cad engine, everything was pre-generated to make it small and play back fast. Randy _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail has tools for the New Busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_1 From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 17 00:25:40 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:25:40 -0700 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA06171.1050101@jetnet.ab.ca> References: , <20100316213514.Y70534@shell.lmi.net>, <4BA06171.1050101@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4BA00564.21694.435D7B@cclist.sydex.com> On 16 Mar 2010 at 22:58, Ben wrote: > What surprized me is the "Happy birthday" song is still copywright. I > think it is the same song, but sometimes you never know just what a > song is named. The legal discussion of the copyright status of that song has probably consumed many acres of prime timber. A few years ago, an acquaintance penned a novelty work titled "Variations on Happy Birthday to You". He was incredulous when I pointed out that Warner Brothers still holds copyright on that chestnut (although many question the validity of the copyright; Wikipedia has a few paragraphs on it). I advised that changing two opening eighth notes of the melody to a single quarter note would solve the problem, provided that the "Birthday" part was left out of the title. I think he ended up by re-titling to "Variations on a Famous Greeting" and combining the opening two notes of the melody. It may or may not be a valid copyright, but Warner's got all the lawyers. There's a fairly well documented episode involving Amazon and the Kindle. Apparently a number of people in the US awoke one morning to find the copy of George Orwell's "1984" gone from their readers. It seems that Amazon had mistankenly used an Australian edition where the work is in the public domain--not so in the US, however. --Chuck From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 17 00:29:52 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 22:29:52 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <201003170421.o2H4LSQC097250@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <20100316222137.B70534@shell.lmi.net> On Wed, 17 Mar 2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > As Jim Leonard said, us developers are more than happy to talk about the > design challenges and how we solved them. I had many cool tricks to do > real time on the PC, and could write a chapter on it. I was approached by a publisher, to do exactly that, with discussion, and code examples. But, one of the first things the publisher said was to NOT let go of the copyright on any of the code examples! I don't think that I will ever do such a disk I/O book, nor do I believe that there would be a market for it. Disks are "so obsolete". But most of my XEDNI(tm) code is going into a manuscript, and none of the licenses that I've peddled for any of it would restrict me from publication. That, too, probably won't be marketable, but I don't let that aspect of reality get in my way. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 17 00:56:10 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 01:56:10 -0400 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> <06A7BDAD-3C2D-4AD8-85F4-B7A3DB5F60D3@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <76A593BC-2980-43EC-8283-3B44CC6729FA@neurotica.com> On Mar 17, 2010, at 12:37 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > The disturbing thing is, while I'm trying to get rid of most of my > collection I'm in the middle of my biggest (and best) Commodore > haul ever. It is free, and slowly being delivered from out of > state. Oh, well, I said I was keeping a lot of the Commodore > stuff. :-) No, you said you were keeping a lot of DEC stuff. Busted! ;) -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From useddec at gmail.com Wed Mar 17 00:57:10 2010 From: useddec at gmail.com (Paul Anderson) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 00:57:10 -0500 Subject: Flyback for Monochrome Plato Student Terminal. In-Reply-To: <001e01cac52c$24a00460$c291a448@aaron> References: <001e01cac52c$24a00460$c291a448@aaron> Message-ID: <624966d61003162257p11f474b7ned92fffd9a5a8906@mail.gmail.com> Hi Aaron, I'm not sure where you are located, but I'm 10 miles from the U of I. I still have a few contacts there who have not retired yet, and I'll ask them to see if they can turn anything up. welcome aboard, and good luck Paul On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 12:14 PM, Aaron Woolfson wrote: > Hi. First time poster. > > I have a bad flyback transformer on a video board that I've been unable to > locate. I've also been unable to find any information about this > transformer, or the board that it's on. I have lots of information about > what the board is inside of, but nothing on the board itself. > > It's for a green monochrome Plato Display Terminal, called an AST-1 Student > Terminal; even the original designer of the equipment, Jack Stifle at the > University of Illinois, does not have any information any more on the video > driver board itself. note: The AST-1 Student terminal was supposed to be a > lightweight inexpensive replacement for the original Plato IV and Plato V > terminals, and was manufactured by the University of Illinois > > I've been able to find many defails from University of Illinois archives, > including all schematics except for the video driver board. > > The transformer is marked as : > VT-521, EIA-528-8521, type sb-1, E36324 > > I assume EIA 528 means Electronic Industry Association manufacturer 528, > with the product (or factory ID) and that's an internal number. The only > "cross-reference" is to a SUN microsystems display, but I have ordered that > flyback and have found it to be the wrong one... > > Here are the links to the photos that I've taken of the board: > > http://customer.telswitch.com/plato/ast001.JPG > http://customer.telswitch.com/plato/ast002.JPG > > The first photo is of the "markings" that the manufacturer must have put > on, the second photo is of the actual board itself. > > The tube that it uses is a Clinton CE745w12h31vrz (which is a standard > 745-style tube). > > Thoughts? > > Thanks! > Aaron > > > From jrubin at spertus.edu Tue Mar 16 11:26:34 2010 From: jrubin at spertus.edu (Jack Rubin) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:26:34 -0500 (CDT) Subject: VAX stuff In-Reply-To: <677652532.1020.1268756715347.JavaMail.root@spertus01.managed.contegix.com> Message-ID: <2022800036.1025.1268756794210.JavaMail.root@spertus01.managed.contegix.com> This stuff is too new and too big for me - located in Illinois (as per bid site). Note that Craters & Frieghters service is available. Jack ----- Forwarded Message ----- To: "Jack Rubin" Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 3:09:20 PM Subject: RE: old DEC gear Hi We have a couple of items forsale on ibid. A Vax 6620 and a TU81 tapedrive current price $1.00 each Here is the link http://ibid.illinois.gov is is under the electronics section. From 1metalguru at gmail.com Tue Mar 16 13:40:35 2010 From: 1metalguru at gmail.com (Darrell Norquay) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 12:40:35 -0600 Subject: Fwd: Old Equipment for sale, PDP8 and S100, with manuals In-Reply-To: <77d877581003141635s66b13b41j605cf255454b1d32@mail.gmail.com> References: <77d877581003141635s66b13b41j605cf255454b1d32@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <77d877581003161140p7b4d7d92gce38fe576f2ac050@mail.gmail.com> Wow! I got a lot of responses to this posting, I wasn't really expecting that. OK, to answer everyone's first question, I live in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Shipping for most of North America wouldn't be too bad, especially with express post or somebody like UPS Ground. The slower the cheaper. The 8A might be a bit pricey, since it's so heavy. Secondly, thanks to all who pointed out that the 8/ series manuals were online. I had no idea they were still so popular. I cut my programming teeth on the PDP11 in college back in the early 70's, and the 8's started to appear in the Surplus Market in the late 70's around here, so I bought a few for a song. Ended up taking up half my basement and they were a real pain to move, so they went away. I used to have a couple of 8/m's with lots of peripherals (2 6' racks worth each), back in the '80's, but sort of lost interest and sold them to a collector. I had boxes full of software on paper tape that would probably be worth something now... Same with the S100 systems, I bought them off the Surplus market from the local University. I'll post a complete list of the boards in the 8/a and the S100 stuff and possibly pictures in the next few days. Can I post photos on this list? If not, can you suggest somewhere to post them? Anyway, thanks to all who replied and I'll try to get back to each individually. Be patient, it will take a few days to get back to everyone. Darrell ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Darrell Norquay <1metalguru at gmail.com> Date: Sun, Mar 14, 2010 at 5:35 PM Subject: Old Equipment for sale, PDP8 and S100, with manuals To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Hi Guys: Just thought I would drop a line and let everyone know that I have some old computer equipment for sale (might even be free to a good home) as listed below: 1. PDP8A system, with programming front panel. Comes with PDP8/A Field Drawings Manual, and I believe it has an A/D peripheral. 2. Somewhere, (I haven't seen them for years) I have a pretty extensive library of PDP8/I manuals on Microfiche. This includes the 32K Disk Subsystem, Hi Speed Paper Tape reader, PDP8/I Math enhancement, Dectape System, etc. Used to have the paper copies, but they were too bulky so I paid to have them put on Microfiche (which was quite pricey as I recall). If anyone is interested, I'll try to come up with more info, including a complete list of the manuals on fiche, and a list of the boards installed in the 8/A. I also have some old modems, including one from an ASR33 TTY, and a 1200 Baud commercial modem from the early 80's. In addition, I have a couple of old S-100 System enclosures with backplanes and power supplies, along with a whole box of S-100 boards including 8085 CPU, memory, A/D, comm cards, and various I/O. Even some manuals to go with... My name is Darrell, and you can contact me at 1MetalGuru(at)gmail.com From jlobocki at gmail.com Wed Mar 17 00:33:25 2010 From: jlobocki at gmail.com (joe lobocki) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 00:33:25 -0500 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> <06A7BDAD-3C2D-4AD8-85F4-B7A3DB5F60D3@neurotica.com> Message-ID: Ok, Im gonna go get some powerball tickets and cross my fingers! I like the two newton prototypes that look like an early attempt at creating an iPad, this stuff should be in a real museum, not up for sale in my opinion. It would be interesting for a piece on how some creations are created in prototype some 10-20 years before their time. Another good example, look at how long SGI has put stereographic 3D glasses ports on their computers, and have had the capabilities, but now it is finally hitting the consumer TV market. On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 11:37 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > At 11:18 PM -0400 3/16/10, Dave McGuire wrote: > >> On Mar 17, 2010, at 12:04 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >> >>> I see a couple items there that I'd be interested in, but no way am I >>> spending that kind of money on anything like that! >>> >> >> I've never seen the general attitude of classiccmp summed up so >> succinctly. ;) >> > > There was a time when I would have considered bidding on at least one of > the items. Now I'm trying to do a massive shrink of my own collection, and > the money I used to spend on Classic Computers is now targeted for more > realistic things. > > The disturbing thing is, while I'm trying to get rid of most of my > collection I'm in the middle of my biggest (and best) Commodore haul ever. > It is free, and slowly being delivered from out of state. Oh, well, I said > I was keeping a lot of the Commodore stuff. :-) > > Zane > > > > -- > | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | > | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | > | | 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 pontus at Update.UU.SE Wed Mar 17 02:26:51 2010 From: pontus at Update.UU.SE (Pontus Pihlgren) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 08:26:51 +0100 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA057B7.2020506@oldskool.org> References: <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> <201003170325.o2H3Ov2H094016@billY.EZWIND.NET> <20100316202819.B70534@shell.lmi.net> <201003170401.o2H40uCE096393@billY.EZWIND.NET> <4BA057B7.2020506@oldskool.org> Message-ID: <20100317072651.GA10211@Update.UU.SE> I've had good experience as well. I got the full source for an Amiga title just by asking. (Admitedly it was not a big corporation who made it, but still). On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 11:16:55PM -0500, Jim Leonard wrote: > On 3/16/2010 10:59 PM, John Foust wrote: > >I hope there's a significant fraction of software developers who would > >be tickled to hear their old stuff is still being appreciated. I suspect > >many would be glad to give it away. > > I have had great reactions from everyone I've contacted regarding > their old works -- in fact, I recommend people try it. Some > examples: > > - Neal White III and Rand E. Bohrer gave me some great > previously-unknown information about their work when I interviewed > them for an article ( > http://www.mobygames.com/featured_article/feature,10/ ). > > - Paul Carruthers was so tickled when I told him the true story that > I was able to complete all 100 designed levels of Archipelagos > (levels past 100 are seed-generated) that he sent me a free copy of > Archipelagos 2000, released only in the UK. > > - The person who did the PC port of Jumpman, when asked questions > about it for a reverse-engineering project ( > http://www.oldskool.org/pc/jumpman ), was kind enough to send as > much of the original code as he could find to the project to help > out. > > - Mark Pelczarski of Pengiun Software/Polarware was kind enough to > send me the asm code for Graphics Magician when I was trying to > write a util to display graphics created by that program. > > It's only the lawyers (who weren't even BORN when the original works > came out) that don't give two shits. In my experience, anyway. > > Geez, I sound old. I'm not even 40 yet. > -- > 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 jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Mar 17 08:12:16 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 08:12:16 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA05BFE.1010501@oldskool.org> References: , , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> <4BA05BFE.1010501@oldskool.org> Message-ID: <4BA0D530.2020509@gmail.com> Jim Leonard wrote: > But you can't claim "first multimedia program on PC". That is just too > wild and vague a statement, especially since you're not defining what > "multimedia" is. Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) From Kevin at RawFedDogs.net Wed Mar 17 08:14:13 2010 From: Kevin at RawFedDogs.net (Kevin Monceaux) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 08:14:13 -0500 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <575131af1003161535k2aadd509pa39aeddc12be806c@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <4553831056AA4605859E3046129B7A2B@ANTONIOPC> <575131af1003160556y27afab1co444ef1f71f13a076@mail.gmail.com> <20100316175446.GA46764@RawFedDogs.net> <575131af1003161535k2aadd509pa39aeddc12be806c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20100317131413.GA73119@RawFedDogs.net> Liam, On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 10:35:05PM +0000, Liam Proven wrote: > Many thanks for the reminder! I do at least feel that I am on the way now, > but it's not the same as the real thing, is it? :?) You're welcome. You're right, it's definitely not the same as the real thing. I have a VAXStation and a MicroVAX at home and to me they're not even quite the same as the "real" thing. My first taste of VMS was on a VAX 11/750. -- Kevin http://www.RawFedDogs.net http://www.WacoAgilityGroup.org Bruceville, TX Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes. Longum iter est per praecepta, breve et efficax per exempla!!! From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Mar 17 08:25:11 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 06:25:11 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA0D530.2020509@gmail.com> from Jules Richardson at "Mar 17, 10 08:12:16 am" Message-ID: <201003171325.o2HDPBdi012362@floodgap.com> > > But you can't claim "first multimedia program on PC". That is just too > > wild and vague a statement, especially since you're not defining what > > "multimedia" is. > > Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) Any computer that resembles John Hodgman. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Magic Eight Ball vs. Microsoft: "Outlook not so good" ---------------------- From dgahling at hotmail.com Wed Mar 17 08:33:17 2010 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 09:33:17 -0400 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <201003171325.o2HDPBdi012362@floodgap.com> References: <4BA0D530.2020509@gmail.com> from Jules Richardson at "Mar 17, Message-ID: That's too funny. can someone reply with the original link for me? for some reason it never showed up on my end, only the replies... :( Dan. > From: spectre at floodgap.com > Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 06:25:11 -0700 > > > > But you can't claim "first multimedia program on PC". That is just too > > > wild and vague a statement, especially since you're not defining what > > > "multimedia" is. > > > > Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) > > Any computer that resembles John Hodgman. > > -- > ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- > Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com > -- Magic Eight Ball vs. Microsoft: "Outlook not so good" ---------------------- _________________________________________________________________ IM on the go with Messenger on your phone http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9712960 From blstuart at bellsouth.net Wed Mar 17 07:41:12 2010 From: blstuart at bellsouth.net (blstuart at bellsouth.net) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 07:41:12 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA0D530.2020509@gmail.com> Message-ID: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net> > Jim Leonard wrote: >> But you can't claim "first multimedia program on PC". That is just too >> wild and vague a statement, especially since you're not defining what >> "multimedia" is. > > Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction pointer) (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are evil) From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Mar 17 10:28:40 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 07:28:40 -0800 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: <76A593BC-2980-43EC-8283-3B44CC6729FA@neurotica.com> References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> <06A7BDAD-3C2D-4AD8-85F4-B7A3DB5F60D3@neurotica.com> <76A593BC-2980-43EC-8283-3B44CC6729FA@neurotica.com> Message-ID: At 1:56 AM -0400 3/17/10, Dave McGuire wrote: >On Mar 17, 2010, at 12:37 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >>The disturbing thing is, while I'm trying to get rid of most of my >>collection I'm in the middle of my biggest (and best) Commodore >>haul ever. It is free, and slowly being delivered from out of >>state. Oh, well, I said I was keeping a lot of the Commodore >>stuff. :-) > > No, you said you were keeping a lot of DEC stuff. Busted! ;) > > -Dave Actually I said I was keeping stuff in both categories. I just don't see me adding any more DEC stuff, and most of the DEC stuff I plan to keep is the common stuff. Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 wbblair3 at yahoo.com Wed Mar 17 09:54:38 2010 From: wbblair3 at yahoo.com (William Blair) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 07:54:38 -0700 (PDT) Subject: The Hard Disk That Changed the World - IBM 305 RAMAC In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <313617.49628.qm@web111514.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Nice IBM sales video and stills: http://gizmodo.com/5494858/ibm-305-ramac-the-grandaddy-of-modern-hard-drives 2006 (50th anniversary) article: http://www.newsweek.com/id/46300 IBM's info: http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/storage/storage_350.html 5 MB (approx.) for only $3,200/month ($24,978 in 2009 dollars)! "Disks rotated at 1,200 rpm, tracks (20 to the inch) were recorded at up to 100 bits per inch, and typical head-to-disk spacing was 800 microinches. The execution of a "seek" instruction positioned a read-write head to the track that contained the desired sector and selected the sector for a later read or write operation. Seek time averaged about 600 milliseconds." From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 17 10:05:50 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 11:05:50 -0400 Subject: Early apple employees Dick and Cliff Huston selling off collection In-Reply-To: References: <629470.86776.qm@web111310.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA044CC.8060001@oldskool.org> <06A7BDAD-3C2D-4AD8-85F4-B7A3DB5F60D3@neurotica.com> <76A593BC-2980-43EC-8283-3B44CC6729FA@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Mar 17, 2010, at 11:28 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >>> The disturbing thing is, while I'm trying to get rid of most of >>> my collection I'm in the middle of my biggest (and best) >>> Commodore haul ever. It is free, and slowly being delivered from >>> out of state. Oh, well, I said I was keeping a lot of the >>> Commodore stuff. :-) >> >> No, you said you were keeping a lot of DEC stuff. Busted! ;) > > Actually I said I was keeping stuff in both categories. I just > don't see me adding any more DEC stuff, and most of the DEC stuff I > plan to keep is the common stuff. Mmm-hmm. Ok Zane, whatever you say. ;) *poke* -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From jdr_use at bluewin.ch Wed Mar 17 11:43:32 2010 From: jdr_use at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 17:43:32 +0100 Subject: The Hard Disk That Changed the World - IBM 305 RAMAC In-Reply-To: <313617.49628.qm@web111514.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <313617.49628.qm@web111514.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4BA106B4.4040807@bluewin.ch> William Blair wrote: > 5 MB (approx.) for only $3,200/month ($24,978 in 2009 dollars)! > I wonder what use case would justify that kind of expense, or would tape storage not have been that much cheaper ? Jos From steve at radiorobots.com Wed Mar 17 12:17:27 2010 From: steve at radiorobots.com (steve stutman) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:17:27 -0400 Subject: The Hard Disk That Changed the World - IBM 305 RAMAC In-Reply-To: <4BA106B4.4040807@bluewin.ch> References: <313617.49628.qm@web111514.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA106B4.4040807@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <4BA10EA7.7050901@radiorobots.com> Jos Dreesen wrote: > William Blair wrote: >> 5 MB (approx.) for only $3,200/month ($24,978 in 2009 dollars)! >> > I wonder what use case would justify that kind of expense, or would > tape storage not have been that much cheaper ? > > Jos See: http://news.cnet.com/The-hard-drive-at-50/2009-1015_3-6112782.html Had the pleasure of speaking with Jim Porter a couple years back. In 1950s paper companies had higher technology perception than on present day screen planet. As stated in article, it was a technology showpiece. He said it also did speed things up. Fewer patch panels, cards, etc. Steve From tshoppa at wmata.com Wed Mar 17 12:34:42 2010 From: tshoppa at wmata.com (Shoppa, Tim) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:34:42 -0400 Subject: The Hard Disk That Changed the World - IBM 305 RAMAC In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Jos asks: >William Blair wrote: >> 5 MB (approx.) for only $3,200/month ($24,978 in 2009 dollars)! >> > I wonder what use case would justify that kind of expense, or would tape > storage not have been that much cheaper ? Undoubtedly tape is cheaper (not just per byte but also per drive) but it's not random access. Clever things were done with tapes, usually in batch mode. The RAMAC made it possible to think that multiple files (not in the computer sense but in the business sense) could be updated simultaneously in real-time. It is a fallacy to confuse the cost of a storage unit with the value that The data on it provides. Clearly as the cost of storage has dropped new applications that previously weren't economically feasible open up. e.g. When I got started in digital music in the 80's, the most technically advanced mixing systems began using hard drives instead of tape for digital music storage and manipulation. Tim. From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 17 12:36:57 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 10:36:57 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA0D530.2020509@gmail.com> References: , , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> <4BA05BFE.1010501@oldskool.org> <4BA0D530.2020509@gmail.com> Message-ID: <20100317103415.F94904@shell.lmi.net> > > But you can't claim "first multimedia program on PC". That is just too > > wild and vague a statement, especially since you're not defining what > > "multimedia" is. On Wed, 17 Mar 2010, Jules Richardson wrote: > Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) We have yet to even adequately define "FIRST". Do we count stuff in the R&D lab that doesn't go into production? Do we count stuff released by nobodies that nobody ever hears about? Does "first" mean first to work? demo? market? From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 17 12:38:34 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 10:38:34 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net> References: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net> Message-ID: <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net> > > Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) On Wed, 17 Mar 2010 blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: > Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction pointer) > (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are evil) What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Wed Mar 17 12:41:18 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 10:41:18 -0700 Subject: The Hard Disk That Changed the World - IBM 305 RAMAC References: <313617.49628.qm@web111514.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA106B4.4040807@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <4BA1143F.8A1D891@cs.ubc.ca> Jos Dreesen wrote: > > William Blair wrote: > > 5 MB (approx.) for only $3,200/month ($24,978 in 2009 dollars)! > > > I wonder what use case would justify that kind of expense, or would tape > storage not have been that much cheaper ? Well, keep in mind that's the rate for a 305 processing system, including a 350 storage unit, not just a 350 storage unit ('hard drive') (see http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/650/650_pr2.html). It actually sounds surprisingly good in comparison to rates for a 709 system, from the 1961 BRL report: Monthly Rental, average system: $55,200 (from: http://ed-thelen.org/comp-hist/BRL61-ibm0709.html) It's not clear exactly what is included in these so there may be some apples and oranges comparision there, but it gives you an idea of what big organisations were willing to pay for some data processing in the period. I've never heard much about the CPU for the 305 system - technical specs, architecture description or how it compared with other contemporary IBM CPUs. From brianlanning at gmail.com Wed Mar 17 12:45:10 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 12:45:10 -0500 Subject: The Hard Disk That Changed the World - IBM 305 RAMAC In-Reply-To: <4BA1143F.8A1D891@cs.ubc.ca> References: <313617.49628.qm@web111514.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA106B4.4040807@bluewin.ch> <4BA1143F.8A1D891@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003171045q6698b8edi8ceb8d0761e3c9cb@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Mar 17, 2010 at 12:41 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote: > It actually sounds surprisingly good in comparison to rates for a 709 > system, > from the 1961 BRL report: > Monthly Rental, average system: $55,200 > (from: http://ed-thelen.org/comp-hist/BRL61-ibm0709.html) > > It's not clear exactly what is included in these so there may be some > apples > and oranges comparision there, but it gives you an idea of what big > organisations were willing to pay for some data processing in the period. > No wonder IBM thought a $6000 PC was a bargain. brian From blstuart at bellsouth.net Wed Mar 17 11:53:59 2010 From: blstuart at bellsouth.net (blstuart at bellsouth.net) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 11:53:59 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <7f569d0a89192f406bbec3deb2ca865a@bellsouth.net> >> > Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) > > On Wed, 17 Mar 2010 blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: >> Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction pointer) >> (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are evil) > > What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? Okay. You got me there. That one isn't evil. :) From ploopster at gmail.com Wed Mar 17 12:57:16 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:57:16 -0400 Subject: The Hard Disk That Changed the World - IBM 305 RAMAC In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003171045q6698b8edi8ceb8d0761e3c9cb@mail.gmail.com> References: <313617.49628.qm@web111514.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA106B4.4040807@bluewin.ch> <4BA1143F.8A1D891@cs.ubc.ca> <6dbe3c381003171045q6698b8edi8ceb8d0761e3c9cb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BA117FC.5020705@gmail.com> Brian Lanning wrote: >> It actually sounds surprisingly good in comparison to rates for a 709 >> system, >> from the 1961 BRL report: >> Monthly Rental, average system: $55,200 >> (from: http://ed-thelen.org/comp-hist/BRL61-ibm0709.html) >> >> It's not clear exactly what is included in these so there may be some >> apples >> and oranges comparision there, but it gives you an idea of what big >> organisations were willing to pay for some data processing in the period. >> > > No wonder IBM thought a $6000 PC was a bargain. Oh puhlease. Peace... Sridhar From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Mar 17 13:01:56 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 11:01:56 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net> References: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net> <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Wed, 17 Mar 2010, Fred Cisin wrote: >>> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) > > On Wed, 17 Mar 2010 blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: >> Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction pointer) >> (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are evil) > > What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? In the US Navy, it stands for "Postal Clerk". In the UK it stands for "Police Constable". Acronyms are evil. Zane From lproven at gmail.com Wed Mar 17 13:08:03 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:08:03 +0000 Subject: Booting a VAXstation In-Reply-To: <20100317131413.GA73119@RawFedDogs.net> References: <575131af1003151120x7d964f9dt1f828346ba1a86a5@mail.gmail.com> <4553831056AA4605859E3046129B7A2B@ANTONIOPC> <575131af1003160556y27afab1co444ef1f71f13a076@mail.gmail.com> <20100316175446.GA46764@RawFedDogs.net> <575131af1003161535k2aadd509pa39aeddc12be806c@mail.gmail.com> <20100317131413.GA73119@RawFedDogs.net> Message-ID: <575131af1003171108w5e79324cr1c06233c2513c393@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Mar 17, 2010 at 1:14 PM, Kevin Monceaux wrote: > Liam, > > On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 10:35:05PM +0000, Liam Proven wrote: > >> Many thanks for the reminder! I do at least feel that I am on the way now, >> but it's not the same as the real thing, is it? :?) > > You're welcome. ?You're right, it's definitely not the same as the real > thing. ?I have a VAXStation and a MicroVAX at home and to me they're not > even quite the same as the "real" thing. ?My first taste of VMS was on a VAX > 11/750. A pair of 11/780s here, in a cluster, which was the main computing resource of Royal Holloway & Bedford New College, University of London, in 1985-1988. Let alone the computer, the *monitor* on my main PC probably has more processing power now. I'm sure any modern printer does. Half a MIPS per node. The smallest embedded ARM could surely stomp all over that now, I guess... I am not the devoted fan of DEC keyboards of many, though. They're wonderful and far better than almost any modern devices, but I still prefer an IBM Model M, such as the one I'm typing on right now. :?) It's probably All Wrong to drive even a simulated VAX with an IBM keyboard, mind you... -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From oltmansg at bellsouth.net Wed Mar 17 13:14:26 2010 From: oltmansg at bellsouth.net (geoffrey oltmans) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 11:14:26 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net> <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <187699.9483.qm@web83903.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> As with all words, context is important. ;) ________________________________ From: Zane H. Healy To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Sent: Wed, March 17, 2010 1:01:56 PM Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC On Wed, 17 Mar 2010, Fred Cisin wrote: >>> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) > > On Wed, 17 Mar 2010 blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: >> Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction pointer) >> (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are evil) > > What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? In the US Navy, it stands for "Postal Clerk". In the UK it stands for "Police Constable". Acronyms are evil. Zane From IanK at vulcan.com Wed Mar 17 13:17:04 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 11:17:04 -0700 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net> <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Zane H. Healy > Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 11:02 AM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > > > > On Wed, 17 Mar 2010, Fred Cisin wrote: > > >>> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) > > > > On Wed, 17 Mar 2010 blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: > >> Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction > pointer) > >> (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are evil) > > > > What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? > > In the US Navy, it stands for "Postal Clerk". > In the UK it stands for "Police Constable". > > Acronyms are evil. > > Zane > ...and then there's the new usage: Politically Correct. Now THAT's evil. -- Ian From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 17 13:28:29 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:28:29 -0400 Subject: The Hard Disk That Changed the World - IBM 305 RAMAC In-Reply-To: <4BA1143F.8A1D891@cs.ubc.ca> References: <313617.49628.qm@web111514.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <4BA106B4.4040807@bluewin.ch> <4BA1143F.8A1D891@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: On 3/17/10, Brent Hilpert wrote: > Jos Dreesen wrote: > I've never heard much about the CPU for the 305 system - technical specs, > architecture description or how it compared with other contemporary IBM > CPUs. I don't have specific technical data at my fingertips, but anecdotally, I worked for a guy whose father ran a 305 RAMAC in Columbus, OH. The machine was at Columbus Coated Fabrics (think "flocked wallpaper"), a division (eventually) of Borden Chemical (think "milk, glue, scratch-n-sniff...") According to the stories, it was the second computer in commercial use in Columbus. -ethan From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Mar 17 13:30:12 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:30:12 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <20100317103415.F94904@shell.lmi.net> References: , , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> <4BA05BFE.1010501@oldskool.org> <4BA0D530.2020509@gmail.com> <20100317103415.F94904@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA11FB4.9020001@gmail.com> Fred Cisin wrote: >>> But you can't claim "first multimedia program on PC". That is just too >>> wild and vague a statement, especially since you're not defining what >>> "multimedia" is. > > On Wed, 17 Mar 2010, Jules Richardson wrote: >> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) > > We have yet to even adequately define "FIRST". I'm considering it fortunate that I wasn't drinking anything when I read that :-) J. From keithvz at verizon.net Wed Mar 17 14:09:37 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 15:09:37 -0400 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <201003170325.o2H3Ov2H094016@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <20100316200428.G70534@shell.lmi.net> <201003170325.o2H3Ov2H094016@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <4BA128F1.90305@verizon.net> John Foust wrote: > At 10:06 PM 3/16/2010, Fred Cisin wrote: >> There is NO argument possible to the explicit transfer of IP rights. > > Do you mean company-to-company, or do you mean licenses, and adherence > to shrinkwrap agreements? > > If the agreement says you can't transfer ownership, then how > can a collector even acquire someone else's old stuff? > > - John > And even if there were some type of agreements, I think the "First Sale" Doctrine would have to kick in here somewhere. Even Microsoft lost(ok, gave up) their copyright suit when a college kid sold his Windows OS disk on ebay. Keith From RichA at vulcan.com Wed Mar 17 14:39:07 2010 From: RichA at vulcan.com (Rich Alderson) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 12:39:07 -0700 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net> <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: From: Zane H. Healy Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 11:02 AM > On Wed, 17 Mar 2010, Fred Cisin wrote: >>>> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) >> On Wed, 17 Mar 2010 blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: >>> Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction pointer) >>> (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are evil) >> What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? > In the US Navy, it stands for "Postal Clerk". > In the UK it stands for "Police Constable". > Acronyms are evil. But is there a problem with unpronounceable abbreviations? I think those are at worst chaotic neutral. Rich From dundas at caltech.edu Wed Mar 17 14:49:42 2010 From: dundas at caltech.edu (John A. Dundas III) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 12:49:42 -0700 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E In-Reply-To: <4BA02A96.9040101@compsys.to> References: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> <4BA02A96.9040101@compsys.to> Message-ID: >If RSTS/E looks like an SJ environment, then it should provide that >information to an >RT-11 request to determine if a mapped monitor is being used. That >will be PERFECT >since the problems can occur ONLY with a mapped RT-11 monitor. It claims to be SJ. >Can anyone verify that the CONFG2 (location 300 offset) word will >show an unmapped monitor? Yes. Please see Table 6-3, page 6-16: Later revisions of the manual agree with the information given. Earlier versions do not contain this level of detail, but I believe the answer is the same. John From dundas at caltech.edu Wed Mar 17 15:04:26 2010 From: dundas at caltech.edu (John A. Dundas III) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:04:26 -0700 Subject: Origin of RT-11 emulation on RSTS Message-ID: I've wondered this for a long time and maybe someone here can shed some light. Back in 1975-76 I was using the PDP-11 and Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI) and they had a thing called "OMSI RT" on their system. It was an RT-11 run time system (RTS) under RSTS. They were selling V1A for $2350 a copy (I still have a copy of the on-line help file giving the information). The product ran the Fortran compiler, MACRO, Pascal, etc., as the later RT-11 environment from DEC did. OMSI RT claimed compatibility with RT-11 V2 and also required a DEC binary license for both RSTS (V5B or later) and RT (V2) My question is: did DEC buy this from OMSI to (improve?) and include in RSTS or was the DEC RT-11 environment created some other way (either developed in-house or purchased from someone else)? Does anyone know the origins of the RT-11 emulation under RSTS? Thanks, John From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 17 15:06:47 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:06:47 -0700 Subject: The Hard Disk That Changed the World - IBM 305 RAMAC In-Reply-To: References: , Message-ID: <4BA0D3E7.20304.1914B14@cclist.sydex.com> I seem to remember that IBM had a demostrator (i.e. nonworking and open) model of the 305 that they displayed at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago during the early 1960s. Anyone know what happened to it? I'm trying to recall if I saw a 305 at Standard Oil in East Chicago around the same time, but memory fails me. An interesting tidbit can be found in the CHM interview transcriptions vis-a-vis the IBM 1311. Apparently at one point, consideration was given to making a prototype with the R/W head unipolar, instead of bipolar, working off of the magnetic oxide formed on the surface of a steel disc. There's a project for some do-it-yourself-ers! Cheers, Chuck From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Mar 17 15:13:29 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:13:29 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA11FB4.9020001@gmail.com> from Jules Richardson at "Mar 17, 10 01:30:12 pm" Message-ID: <201003172013.o2HKDTZg012936@floodgap.com> > > > > But you can't claim "first multimedia program on PC". That is just too > > > > wild and vague a statement, especially since you're not defining what > > > > "multimedia" is. > > > > > > Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) > > > > We have yet to even adequately define "FIRST". > > I'm considering it fortunate that I wasn't drinking anything when I read > that :-) Fred is clearly jumping the gun. Two presidential administrations later and we still haven't figured out what the definition of "is" is. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Hell hath no fury like a bureaucrat scorned. -- Milton Freedman ------------ From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 17 14:54:35 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 19:54:35 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B9F9D98.23540.1430174@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 16, 10 03:02:48 pm Message-ID: > Many, if not most, microcontrollers (but for the very tiny ones) have > some sort of on-chip (e.g. JTAG) debugging facility. Given that > everything else is on-chip, why would you want to monitor the > internal bus signals, even if you could? I thought I'd explained that, maybe not. Wehn my newly-built miocrocontroller system doesn't work (notice I did not sai 'if' :-)), I want to debug it. If I can connect a logic analyser to the address liens of the program store, I can trace the program and compare it with what I think it should be doing. And hopefully find the bug (or alternatively find that the microotroller is defective, which is unlikely). I didn't find debugging PIC code particularly pleasant. I was using all the I/O lines in the system, so I couldn't (sensilhly) output a value on some port pins when the progrma got to a particular point. In any case, you go mad continually re-assembling the code with different points 'marked' in this way. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 17 15:06:57 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 20:06:57 +0000 (GMT) Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <4BA04462.7030106@oldskool.org> from "Jim Leonard" at Mar 16, 10 09:54:26 pm Message-ID: > > On 3/16/2010 3:09 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > > What are you really trying to do? Waht is the machine you are taking the > > outputs from, and what are you trying to do with them? > > Trying to capture the output of a program running on an IBM 5160 that > only looks correct via CGA RGB output. Right. And what are you capturing it on? What inputs _exactly_ do you have? For example, do you have separate syncs, composite sync, or sync-on-green? > > >> I would need to go to school to understand what I would be looking at. > > > > Err, I didn't. For the record I have never had a single formal class in > > any form of electronicvs. > > For the record, you are one of a kind. I say that with the sincerest > form of flattery. Unfortuately, I suspect that is true :-( > > Had I enough free time, I could learn it too, but I don't have much > these days. My free time in my youth was spent learning the hardware > from the outside (ie. assembler programming), not the inside. I have the opposite problem. I learnt hardware first. Which means I tend to think about probramming as to what it will do to the hardware (somtimes at a very low level). -tony From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 17 16:25:02 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:25:02 -0700 (PDT) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <201003172013.o2HKDTZg012936@floodgap.com> References: <201003172013.o2HKDTZg012936@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <20100317142143.J2201@shell.lmi.net> > > > We have yet to even adequately define "FIRST". On Wed, 17 Mar 2010, Cameron Kaiser wrote: > Fred is clearly jumping the gun. Two presidential administrations later and > we still haven't figured out what the definition of "is" is. We have had quite a few discussions where the definition of "FIRST" would be essential, ranging from "the first computer on the internet", to "when do we consider the Amiga, or even Pet, to have first come out. Does Comdex count? Or are we talking about which one I could unpack and set up in my home first? From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 17 17:27:04 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 15:27:04 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: <4B9F9D98.23540.1430174@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 16, 10 03:02:48 pm, Message-ID: <4BA0F4C8.14696.211BBFF@cclist.sydex.com> On 17 Mar 2010 at 19:54, Tony Duell wrote: > Wehn my newly-built miocrocontroller system doesn't work (notice I did > not sai 'if' :-)), I want to debug it. If I can connect a logic > analyser to the address liens of the program store, I can trace the > program and compare it with what I think it should be doing. And > hopefully find the bug (or alternatively find that the microotroller > is defective, which is unlikely). I don't think we're connecting intellectually. But most JTAG debuggers allow for breakpoints/watches, register examination/alteration, single-step, etc. And there's at least one debug interface that uses a one-wire connection to the RESET pin, so you get to use all of the I/Os. Try debugging your FPGA design without JTAG. So, I'm still mystified. Maybe I just don't understand what you're getting at. --Chuck From legalize at xmission.com Wed Mar 17 18:02:38 2010 From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 17:02:38 -0600 Subject: Dire Straits Computer Graphics? In-Reply-To: Your message of Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:49:02 -0800. <201003110149.o2B1n2Jt014554@floodgap.com> Message-ID: In article <201003110149.o2B1n2Jt014554 at floodgap.com>, Cameron Kaiser writes: > Yup! Wikipedia has a nice little article listing the computer as a Bosch > FGS-4000. IIRC, that device was created in Salt Lake City. Bosch later become Philips Digital Video Systems and I worked there for a few years. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download Legalize Adulthood! From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Mar 17 18:31:14 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:31:14 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <201003172013.o2HKDTZg012936@floodgap.com> References: <201003172013.o2HKDTZg012936@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <4BA16642.5090306@gmail.com> Cameron Kaiser wrote: >>>>> But you can't claim "first multimedia program on PC". That is just too >>>>> wild and vague a statement, especially since you're not defining what >>>>> "multimedia" is. >>>> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) >>> We have yet to even adequately define "FIRST". >> I'm considering it fortunate that I wasn't drinking anything when I read >> that :-) > > Fred is clearly jumping the gun. Two presidential administrations later and > we still haven't figured out what the definition of "is" is. That time I *was* drinking something, you bastard. ;-) From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Wed Mar 17 18:55:28 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:55:28 -0500 Subject: Dire Straits Computer Graphics? In-Reply-To: References: Your message of Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:49:02 -0800. Message-ID: It would not suprise me if this hardware has origins or connections going back to 'Graphics, Utah Style' : Ivan Sutherland Hank Christansen MOVIE.BYU (later CQUEL.BYU) Brigham Young University was a leader in the beginnings of computer graphics. A web search of the Bosch shows it was about $1M, and used a lot in courtroom trial animations (Z-axis, Forensic Technologies Inc.) Thats how I got my start in 3d animation; crashing cars, doing plant explosions, and then a roller coaster accident... The stand alone systems kind of went away after Symbolics. Wavefront and Alias ran on SGI, Sun and Tek. These too later got buried after Alias bought Wavefront, and ported it to the PC as Maya. 3d is cheap now, however it still takes years to become a talented animator. Randy > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > From: legalize at xmission.com > Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 17:02:38 -0600 > Subject: Re: Dire Straits Computer Graphics? > > > In article <201003110149.o2B1n2Jt014554 at floodgap.com>, > Cameron Kaiser writes: > > > Yup! Wikipedia has a nice little article listing the computer as a Bosch > > FGS-4000. > > IIRC, that device was created in Salt Lake City. Bosch later become > Philips Digital Video Systems and I worked there for a few years. > -- > "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download > > > Legalize Adulthood! _________________________________________________________________ The New Busy is not the old busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_3 From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 17 19:06:04 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 00:06:04 +0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA16E6C.9090109@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: > And hopefully find the > bug (or alternatively find that the microotroller is defective, which is > unlikely). Ugh, I've had that happen. Once on a PIC that had taken a hit from a 24V power supply, and once on a new-in-tube W65C02SP (which had a seriously screwed up ALU). > I didn't find debugging PIC code particularly pleasant. I was using all > the I/O lines in the system, so I couldn't (sensilhly) output a value on > some port pins when the progrma got to a particular point. In any case, > you go mad continually re-assembling the code with different points > 'marked' in this way. You know, there is a reason Microchip released the ICD2, ICD3 and PICKit2 Debug Express. All of the three support in-circuit debugging over the programming pins -- set a code breakpoint (or watchpoint), wait for it to trigger, then dump the program state. Beats the LEDs-and-switches debugging method, or the "hook a terminal up" trick... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to Wed Mar 17 19:47:56 2010 From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 19:47:56 -0500 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E In-Reply-To: References: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> <4BA02A96.9040101@compsys.to> Message-ID: <4BA1783C.9010507@compsys.to> >John A. Dundas III wrote: >> If RSTS/E looks like an SJ environment, then it should provide that >> information to an >> RT-11 request to determine if a mapped monitor is being used. That >> will be PERFECT >> since the problems can occur ONLY with a mapped RT-11 monitor. > > It claims to be SJ. Looks like it is a close as it could be under RSTS/E. Very Good >> Can anyone verify that the CONFG2 (location 300 offset) word will >> show an unmapped monitor? > > Yes. > > Please see Table 6-3, page 6-16: > > > > > Later revisions of the manual agree with the information given. > Earlier versions do not contain this level of detail, but I believe > the answer is the same. THANK YOU AGAIN!!!! This is exactly what I required. The information in this manual confirms that the .GVal EMT request for location 300 (it is actually CONFG1) will state that an unmapped monitor is running. The only other question is how to determine the device name of the program which is running. Under RT-11, the .CStatus EMT returns the physical device name of the program file which is open on channel 17 since it is overlaid. The manual states that .DStatus EMT is available, but ignores the .CStatus EMT, except by default which leads me to interrupt that such information is not available under RSTS/E. Is anyone familiar with the RSTS/E RT-11 run time system? Was .CStatus ever added for support. The possible solution is to default to assuming the program is on the system device, SY:, which is already known to work. I can place a -1 in the .CStatus area before the EMT request and if that value is still there, use SY: for the device name. Disappointing, but not much of any other option I can think of. Can anyone else suggest something I have missed? Jerome Fine From legalize at xmission.com Thu Mar 18 03:43:10 2010 From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 02:43:10 -0600 Subject: Dire Straits Computer Graphics? In-Reply-To: Your message of Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:55:28 -0500. Message-ID: In article , Randy Dawson writes: > Brigham Young University was a leader in the beginnings of computer graphic= > s. University of Utah was a leader in the beginnings of computer graphics. BYU did stuff later. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download Legalize Adulthood! From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Thu Mar 18 04:29:51 2010 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 10:29:51 +0100 (CET) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net> <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Wed, 17 Mar 2010, Zane H. Healy wrote: >>>> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) >>> Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction pointer) >>> (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are evil) >> >> What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? > > In the US Navy, it stands for "Postal Clerk". > In the UK it stands for "Police Constable". Polycarbonate Christian From feldman.r at comcast.net Thu Mar 18 09:38:41 2010 From: feldman.r at comcast.net (feldman.r at comcast.net) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 14:38:41 +0000 (UTC) Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC Message-ID: <1860941685.2821291268923121062.JavaMail.root@sz0065a.emeryville.ca.mail.comcast.net> >Message: 15 >Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 15:09:37 -0400 >From: Keith < keithvz at verizon.net > >Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC >And even if there were some type of agreements, I think the "First Sale" >??Doctrine would have to kick in here somewhere. > >Even Microsoft lost(ok, gave up) their copyright suit when a college kid >??sold his Windows OS disk on ebay. > >Keith Also,? in October of 2009, Autodesk lost its suit against a man who bought a copy of AutoCAD at a garage sale and then tried to sell it on eBay: "US court says software is owned, not licensed" http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2009/10/06/software_ownership_ruling/ From dundas at caltech.edu Thu Mar 18 09:54:34 2010 From: dundas at caltech.edu (John A. Dundas III) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 07:54:34 -0700 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E In-Reply-To: <4BA1783C.9010507@compsys.to> References: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> <4BA02A96.9040101@compsys.to> <4BA1783C.9010507@compsys.to> Message-ID: Jerome, At 7:47 PM -0500 3/17/10, Jerome H. Fine wrote: >The only other question is how to determine the device name of the >program which is >running. Under RT-11, the .CStatus EMT returns the physical device >name of the >program file which is open on channel 17 since it is overlaid. The >manual states that >.DStatus EMT is available, but ignores the .CStatus EMT, except by >default which >leads me to interrupt that such information is not available under >RSTS/E. Is anyone >familiar with the RSTS/E RT-11 run time system? Was .CStatus ever added for >support. The possible solution is to default to assuming the >program is on the system >device, SY:, which is already known to work. I can place a -1 in >the .CStatus area >before the EMT request and if that value is still there, use SY: for >the device name. > >Disappointing, but not much of any other option I can think of. Can >anyone else >suggest something I have missed? Not sure why you need to change what MACRO/CREF are already doing; they work as is under RSTS. If you're fixing a Y2k bug the file chaining code, and for that matter the rest as well, works just as well under RSTS as it does under RT. I would think the best approach is not to change anything, unless it specifically addresses a bug. John From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to Thu Mar 18 13:41:21 2010 From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 13:41:21 -0500 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E In-Reply-To: References: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> <4BA02A96.9040101@compsys.to> <4BA1783C.9010507@compsys.to> Message-ID: <4BA273D1.8020904@compsys.to> >John A. Dundas III wrote: > >At 7:47 PM -0500 3/17/10, Jerome H. Fine wrote: > >> The only other question is how to determine the device name of the >> program which is >> running. Under RT-11, the .CStatus EMT returns the physical device >> name of the >> program file which is open on channel 17 since it is overlaid. The >> manual states that >> .DStatus EMT is available, but ignores the .CStatus EMT, except by >> default which >> leads me to interrupt that such information is not available under >> RSTS/E. Is anyone >> familiar with the RSTS/E RT-11 run time system? Was .CStatus ever >> added for >> support. The possible solution is to default to assuming the program >> is on the system >> device, SY:, which is already known to work. I can place a -1 in the >> .CStatus area >> before the EMT request and if that value is still there, use SY: for >> the device name. >> >> Disappointing, but not much of any other option I can think of. Can >> anyone else >> suggest something I have missed? > > Not sure why you need to change what MACRO/CREF are already doing; > they work as is under RSTS. If you're fixing a Y2k bug the file > chaining code, and for that matter the rest as well, works just as > well under RSTS as it does under RT. I would think the best approach > is not to change anything, unless it specifically addresses a bug. >From my testing of MACRO / CREF under RT-11, there are 3 separate problems, in addition to the lack of the 4 digit year when DEC added support for the years after 1999: (a) The DEC version of the MACRO / CREF pair can ONLY be located on the SY: device since the .Chain EMT request is hard coded to transfer control back and forth to each other using only files on the device SY:. No other utility program has that restriction. Note that this problem exists on all three operating systems: RSTS/E, TSX-PLUS and RT-11. (b) Under RT-11, when running under a mapped operating system, if VBGEXE is used under a background job to explicitly load and initiate MACRO.SAV, then any subsequent CSI requests to continue with the assembly of additional files will NOT continue under VBGEXE which will frequently result in insufficient memory for MACRO.SAV to execute. If you are not familiar with the RT-11 utility VBGEXE.SAV, it is used under a mapped monitor to load into extended memory (64K in size) and execute a program which can make use the larger memory available. (c) Under RT-11, when running MACRO.SAV as a system job, VBGEXE is required to load into extended memory (64K in size) and initiate MACRO.SAV; however, if a cross-reference table is requested, the .Chain EMT will cause the job to abort with the complete loss of the listing file. As it happens, according to the PDF that you suggested that I look at, the .SaveStatus EMT request under RSTS/E returns the device name of the file in question - as opposed to the RT-11 values which are totally different. However, since there is no specific mention of the .CStatus EMT request in the PDF as to what happens if used under RSTS/E (the most probable result is that the .CStatus EMT request will be ignored under RSTS/E), then program control will be used to solve if RSTS/E is being used vs RT-11 when MACRO.SAV is found to be executing under an unmapped monitor. This is because the third word of the data block returned by RSTS/E for the .SaveStatus EMT request will be 6544 decimal (RAD50 "RO" = 12620 octal = 4096+2048+384+16) which is very different from the size of MACRO.SAV (about 100 blocks) which is the value found in the third word under RT-11,. I found this information in the PDF on pages 6-10 and 7-57. There is also a final question about the information in the PDF on page 6-16 which states that bit 5 of offset 300 will always be zero. Are there no RSTS/E systems running where the power is 50 Hz rather than 60 Hz? Unless this omission has been corrected, but the documentation has not been updated? Otherwise, the TIME printed on the listing from MACRO.SAV will be incorrect if run under a 50 Hz system. Likewise for other programs which check bit 5 in offset 300 (the .GVal EMT request) and attempt to convert ticks to the time. If you don't use RT-11 very much, then you probably have not noticed problems (b) and (c). In addition, if you have only the DEC versions MACRO / CREF, then it is very unlikely that you will ever want to have available more than one version on a different device from SY:, but I find the restriction sort of silly if there is a simple solution to the problem. It seems that DEC almost always provided code which left out additional bells and whistles that were easy to add. But, then as a profit making company (maybe that is a more fundamental question), only the bells and whistles that were popular were added. For example, RSTS/E fully supports READ-ONLY files. By V05.06 of RT-11, this feature was also supported, but DEC never bothered to update DIR and PIP to reflect that aspect. I have tested RT-11 support for READ-ONLY files by using SIPP to set and clear the correct bit in the file header in the directory segment just to test my assumption. Works GREAT!!! But, DIR does not provide that status and PIP can't change the bit setting. Jerome Fine From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Thu Mar 18 14:54:46 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 14:54:46 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net>, <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net>, , Message-ID: > Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 10:29:51 +0100 > From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > > On Wed, 17 Mar 2010, Zane H. Healy wrote: > >>>> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) > >>> Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction pointer) > >>> (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are evil) > >> > >> What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? > > > > In the US Navy, it stands for "Postal Clerk". > > In the UK it stands for "Police Constable". > > Polycarbonate > > Christian Programmable Controller Randy _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Trusted email with Microsoft?s powerful SPAM protection. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/210850552/direct/01/ From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Thu Mar 18 15:06:52 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 16:06:52 -0400 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net> <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: Many people wrote: >> >>>> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) >> >>> Program counter... >> >> >> >> What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? >> > >> > In the US Navy, it stands for "Postal Clerk". >> > In the UK it stands for "Police Constable". >> >> Polycarbonate >> > Programmable Controller Or any one of nearly 300 other common uses - http://acronyms.thefreedictionary.com/PC -ethan From ploopster at gmail.com Thu Mar 18 15:09:08 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 16:09:08 -0400 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: References: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net>, <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net>, , Message-ID: <4BA28864.8040601@gmail.com> Randy Dawson wrote: >>>>>> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) >>>>> Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction pointer) >>>>> (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are evil) >>>> >>>> What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? >>> >>> In the US Navy, it stands for "Postal Clerk". >>> In the UK it stands for "Police Constable". >> >> Polycarbonate > > Programmable Controller Pubococcygeus. Peace... Sridhar From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 18 15:14:17 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 16:14:17 -0400 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <4BA28864.8040601@gmail.com> References: <784c15a3d118b04f1a5fae8f05b1e68d@bellsouth.net>, <20100317103740.O94904@shell.lmi.net>, , <4BA28864.8040601@gmail.com> Message-ID: <18432AD1-2ED5-491D-BF74-449794C86ADC@neurotica.com> On Mar 18, 2010, at 4:09 PM, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: >>>>>>> Wait... what's the definition of a PC again? ;-) >>>>>> Program counter, known in some circles as the IP (instruction >>>>>> pointer) >>>>>> (N.B. editorial opinion: all other uses of those initials are >>>>>> evil) >>>>> >>>>> What is wrong with "Printed Circuit"? >>>> >>>> In the US Navy, it stands for "Postal Clerk". >>>> In the UK it stands for "Police Constable". >>> >>> Polycarbonate >> >> Programmable Controller > > Pubococcygeus. ...and his all-girl orchestra. -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 18 14:33:05 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 19:33:05 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA0F4C8.14696.211BBFF@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 17, 10 03:27:04 pm Message-ID: > But most JTAG debuggers allow for breakpoints/watches, register > examination/alteration, single-step, etc. And there's at least one > debug interface that uses a one-wire connection to the RESET pin, so > you get to use all of the I/Os. Sure.. But there are several problems with that approach. The main one is that a breakpoint is intrusive, it changes the behaviour of the system. You can't sensibly put a breakpoint in a time-critical routine. But you certainly can monitor the program flow in such a routine with a logic analyser, assuming you can get access to the program store address bus. And a logic analyser will tell you different things to a breakpoint. OK, at a breakpoint (if the debugging hardware is designed sensibly), you can exame CPU registers, etc. But it woun't necessarily tell you how the code got to the breakpoint. A logic analyser will/ Another problem is that you are depending on the microcontoller chip to be mostly working properly for the JTAG port to work. Which is likely, but not certain, to be the case. And of course for me there's the prcatical problem of not having a JTAG interface. Yes, I know it's just a few TTL lines clocking data in and out serially. It's not hard to bit-bang, but it's one more thing to debug. And if I make a mistage in the JTAG hardware, or more likely in the code to drive it, I am going to be going round in circles looking for the problem. > > Try debugging your FPGA design without JTAG. I am not taliking about FPGAs... I'd rather not design with them, thank you. And it is IMHO falacious to assume that because something is a good method in once case, it has to be the right method in all cases. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 18 14:36:54 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 19:36:54 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA16E6C.9090109@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 18, 10 00:06:04 am Message-ID: > You know, there is a reason Microchip released the ICD2, ICD3 and > PICKit2 Debug Express. All of the three support in-circuit debugging How 'open#' is this internface/specification. Is there enough detail availble for me to write the host program for a machine/OS of my choice (becuase I will bet the one Microchip supply doesn't run on the machine I would want to run it on, or indeed on anythign I own) -tony From dundas at caltech.edu Thu Mar 18 15:31:17 2010 From: dundas at caltech.edu (John A. Dundas III) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 13:31:17 -0700 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E In-Reply-To: <4BA273D1.8020904@compsys.to> References: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> <4BA02A96.9040101@compsys.to> <4BA1783C.9010507@compsys.to> <4BA273D1.8020904@compsys.to> Message-ID: At 1:41 PM -0500 3/18/10, Jerome H. Fine wrote: > >John A. Dundas III wrote: >>Not sure why you need to change what MACRO/CREF are already doing; >>they work as is under RSTS. If you're fixing a Y2k bug the file >>chaining code, and for that matter the rest as well, works just as >>well under RSTS as it does under RT. I would think the best >>approach is not to change anything, unless it specifically >>addresses a bug. > >>From my testing of MACRO / CREF under RT-11, there are 3 separate >>problems, in addition to >the lack of the 4 digit year when DEC added support for the years after 1999: > >(a) The DEC version of the MACRO / CREF pair can ONLY be located on >the SY: device > since the .Chain EMT request is hard coded to transfer control >back and forth to each > other using only files on the device SY:. No other utility >program has that restriction. > Note that this problem exists on all three operating systems: >RSTS/E, TSX-PLUS and > RT-11. Well, under RSTS it's a little different. Under the hood, things are set up so that CREF is chained to (and, e.g., MACRO returned to, though CREF is not limited to talking to MACRO) when they exist in the system ($) account. The $ account can span multiple physical disks. Programs don't need to [explicitly] know about it, the OS finds it for them. However $ maps to a single [PPN]. So I don't see this as a limitation. If MACRO and CREF are installed normally, everything works as it's supposed to. The real "limitation" that I am aware of is that you can't have MACRO chain to a private version of CREF. Say you're working on a development version of CREF. You need to write your own harness to exercise it; you can't use the system version of MACRO, FOR, etc., to do that. From the perspective of a (former) system manager, it's not a problem. Remember, this is a multi-user timesharing system. Quite a bit different from the RT audience. >(b) Under RT-11, when running under a mapped operating system, if >VBGEXE is used under There is no concept of VBGEXE under RSTS. MACRO can be used to compile multiple files, in separate compiles (I think that's what you're getting at), without reloading. Either way, again, this is not a problem for a timesharing system. Multiple instances can be running simultaneously, without problem. >(c) Under RT-11, when running MACRO.SAV as a system job, VBGEXE is required to > load into extended memory (64K in size) and initiate MACRO.SAV; >however, if a > cross-reference table is requested, the .Chain EMT will cause >the job to abort with > the complete loss of the listing file. A non-issue with RSTS. >As it happens, according to the PDF that you suggested that I look >at, the .SaveStatus >EMT request under RSTS/E returns the device name of the file in >question - as opposed >to the RT-11 values which are totally different. However, since >there is no specific mention >of the .CStatus EMT request in the PDF as to what happens if used >under RSTS/E (the >most probable result is that the .CStatus EMT request will be >ignored under RSTS/E), then >program control will be used to solve if RSTS/E is being used vs >RT-11 when MACRO.SAV >is found to be executing under an unmapped monitor. This is because >the third word of the >data block returned by RSTS/E for the .SaveStatus EMT request will >be 6544 decimal >(RAD50 "RO" = 12620 octal = 4096+2048+384+16) which is very >different from the size >of MACRO.SAV (about 100 blocks) which is the value found in the >third word under >RT-11,. I found this information in the PDF on pages 6-10 and 7-57. I'm not following where there is a problem, but OK. >There is also a final question about the information in the PDF on >page 6-16 which states >that bit 5 of offset 300 will always be zero. Are there no RSTS/E >systems running where >the power is 50 Hz rather than 60 Hz? Unless this omission has been >corrected, but the >documentation has not been updated? Otherwise, the TIME printed on >the listing from >MACRO.SAV will be incorrect if run under a 50 Hz system. Likewise >for other programs >which check bit 5 in offset 300 (the .GVal EMT request) and attempt >to convert ticks to >the time. Yes, RSTS runs on 50Hz systems, no problem, though I've never personally done it. All I know is that RSTS attempts to present the time value in a format RT expects (as it keeps time different internally from RT). Maybe the ticks value IS wrong. Is it every displayed? I just don't remember whether MACRO uses that in its listings or not. A review of the source code for an older version of the emulator suggests that the 50/60Hz bit (5) is always set to 0. Oh well. There is one other discrepancy between the documentation and the source: evidently bit 15 (system clock presence) DOES get set, always, contrary to what is written in the manual. John From melamy at earthlink.net Thu Mar 18 15:33:58 2010 From: melamy at earthlink.net (melamy at earthlink.net) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 16:33:58 -0400 (EDT) Subject: Disc analyser news update Message-ID: <24460148.1268944439526.JavaMail.root@elwamui-karabash.atl.sa.earthlink.net> if you want specs to programming microchip ics, go here... http://www.microchip.com/stellent/idcplg?IdcService=SS_GET_PAGE&nodeId=1407 best regards, Steve Thatcher -----Original Message----- >From: Tony Duell >Sent: Mar 18, 2010 3:36 PM >To: cctalk at classiccmp.org >Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > >> You know, there is a reason Microchip released the ICD2, ICD3 and >> PICKit2 Debug Express. All of the three support in-circuit debugging > >How 'open#' is this internface/specification. Is there enough detail >availble for me to write the host program for a machine/OS of my choice >(becuase I will bet the one Microchip supply doesn't run on the machine I >would want to run it on, or indeed on anythign I own) > >-tony > From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 18 16:21:38 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 14:21:38 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: <4BA0F4C8.14696.211BBFF@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 17, 10 03:27:04 pm, Message-ID: <4BA236F2.31961.F931A3@cclist.sydex.com> On 18 Mar 2010 at 19:33, Tony Duell wrote: > And a logic analyser will tell you different things to a breakpoint. > OK, at a breakpoint (if the debugging hardware is designed sensibly), > you can exame CPU registers, etc. But it woun't necessarily tell you > how the code got to the breakpoint. A logic analyser will/ Hardly! Maybe on vintage CPUs, but not on anything made in the last 20 years. Caching, prefetch queues, scheduling hardware and integrated peripherals make a logic analyzer of marginal use in debugging program flow. Times have changed and so have methods. For example, simulation is used a lot more than it used to be for designs, as is on-chip debugging support. --Chuck From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Thu Mar 18 16:40:23 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 22:40:23 +0100 Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM Message-ID: <8A7C340645D344C1A802328771245D8E@xp1800> I aquired a HP 2671A thermal printer and know that there should be an upgrade ROM to 'upgrade' it to a HP 2671G. Thanks to Tony excelent work on HPCC CDROM i have the schematics and was able to fix the head positioning circuit. One of the driver transistors (TIP 122) was bad after replacing it and cleaning the printer it works fine. But now I want to use it for printing graphics (diagrams) and would be very happy whith an image of the graphics ROM. -Rik PS. don't shoot me if it appears a second time, I used the first time the wrong email address.......:-( From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Thu Mar 18 16:44:55 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 16:44:55 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA236F2.31961.F931A3@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4BA0F4C8.14696.211BBFF@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at,Mar 17, 10 03:27:04 pm, ,<4BA236F2.31961.F931A3@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: Just a thought Code debug probably is done best in a virtual machine, or an emulator where you can instrument the heck out of it. There once was 'bond out' intel (and other) cpus specifically for emulation / debug. You got hardware signal access to the internal registers and state of the machine. I also recall that TASM could remotely debug over a network connection so the target could run at full speed, Im sure all modern Visual C++ or gnu debug can do the same. Randy > From: cclist at sydex.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 14:21:38 -0700 > Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > > On 18 Mar 2010 at 19:33, Tony Duell wrote: > > > And a logic analyser will tell you different things to a breakpoint. > > OK, at a breakpoint (if the debugging hardware is designed sensibly), > > you can exame CPU registers, etc. But it woun't necessarily tell you > > how the code got to the breakpoint. A logic analyser will/ > > Hardly! Maybe on vintage CPUs, but not on anything made in the last > 20 years. Caching, prefetch queues, scheduling hardware and > integrated peripherals make a logic analyzer of marginal use in > debugging program flow. > > Times have changed and so have methods. For example, simulation is > used a lot more than it used to be for designs, as is on-chip > debugging support. > > --Chuck > _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Trusted email with powerful SPAM protection. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/210850553/direct/01/ From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Mar 18 16:52:18 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 17:52:18 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: <4BA0F4C8.14696.211BBFF@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at, Mar 17, 10 03:27:04 pm, , <4BA236F2.31961.F931A3@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <0AF8ADDE-294B-4FAD-992C-D71B85CC332B@neurotica.com> On Mar 18, 2010, at 5:44 PM, Randy Dawson wrote: > Code debug probably is done best in a virtual machine, or an emulator where you can instrument the heck out of it. > There once was 'bond out' intel (and other) cpus specifically for emulation / debug. You got hardware signal access to the internal registers and state of the machine. I have some bondout chips in my mcs51 emulator, for the Philips P89C66x chips. They give you direct access to the signals that Tony is complaining about being inaccessible. > I also recall that TASM could remotely debug over a network connection so the target could run at full speed, Im sure all modern Visual C++ or gnu debug can do the same. Yes, gdb can. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From chrise at pobox.com Thu Mar 18 08:15:30 2010 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 08:15:30 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA16E6C.9090109@philpem.me.uk> References: <4BA16E6C.9090109@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <20100318131530.GI3420@n0jcf.net> On Thursday (03/18/2010 at 12:06AM +0000), Philip Pemberton wrote: > > You know, there is a reason Microchip released the ICD2, ICD3 and > PICKit2 Debug Express. All of the three support in-circuit debugging > over the programming pins -- set a code breakpoint (or watchpoint), wait > for it to trigger, then dump the program state. And do those debugger tools run on any OS other than Windows? > Beats the LEDs-and-switches debugging method, or the "hook a terminal > up" trick... If the answer to the above is No, then it does not beat the "hook a terminal up" trick... or an LED trick or plenty of other tricks... not by a long shot. Chris -- Chris Elmquist From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 18 17:19:09 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 15:19:09 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: <4BA0F4C8.14696.211BBFF@cclist.sydex.com>, <4BA236F2.31961.F931A3@cclist.sydex.com>, Message-ID: <4BA2446D.20809.12DDAB8@cclist.sydex.com> On 18 Mar 2010 at 16:44, Randy Dawson wrote: > Code debug probably is done best in a virtual machine, or an emulator > where you can instrument the heck out of it. There once was 'bond out' > intel (and other) cpus specifically for emulation / debug. You got > hardware signal access to the internal registers and state of the > machine. Yes, "bond-out" versions of chips always came after the initial release of the chip and long after pre-release steppings--after the people on the bleeding edge had already done their debugging the hard way. Ultimately, the best debugger usually turns out to reside somewhere within the mushy wet stuff between the ears. Observe, conjecture, test, confirm. I've yet to see a simulator that will function exactly the same way that an actual device does in responding to real-world events. The problem is that the guy writing the simulator is working from the vantage point of knowing how the device is *supposed* to work, not how it actually works. You never want a programmer who knows how your application works to be the one testing it, because he knows how it's *supposed* to work and unconsciously focuses his texting within that context. --Chuck From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Thu Mar 18 16:47:06 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 21:47:06 -0000 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) References: <6dbe3c381003111156u7e3f9b66l9af97cad50cf3dc3@mail.gmail.com><4B9957E1.6000006@arachelian.com> <06EB9B28607243ED93F7A90C2832C49F@dell8300><005201cac490$8be1db90$f0fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4B9EB987.2090004@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <009301cac6e9$26556250$f9fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ben" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 10:49 PM Subject: Re: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) > Andrew Burton wrote: > > > You can say that again (the bit in brackets in the last sentence). If I > > drink Diet Cola it makes me sick, as in regurgitating what I ate recently. > > So I stay well away from diet drinks... but I have a few other allergies too > > (hayfever, asthma, eczema and certain plastics cause irration to my skin > > after contact for 5-10 minutes). I suppose I should count myself lucky that > > I'm not allergic to sunlight. > > What about the other programing food: Pizza? > I have no problems with Pizza (have it for my evening meal every Tuesday), but I like to keep food and drink away from my computers. I don't fancy cleaning a keyboard or trying to pry food out from their internals. Besides, once I'm in "the zone" I can keep going for a few hours without realising how much time has passed by :) Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Thu Mar 18 16:55:05 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 21:55:05 -0000 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) References: , <005201cac490$8be1db90$f0fdf93e@user8459cef6fa>, <4B9EB987.2090004@jetnet.ab.ca> <4B9E6B16.24906.1C41815@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <009401cac6e9$27d80ab0$f9fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Chuck Guzis" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2010 12:15 AM Subject: Re: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) > On 15 Mar 2010 at 16:49, Ben wrote: > > > What about the other programing food: Pizza? > > I eat pizza, but I make it from scratch. The stuff sold from the > chain outfits (Pizza Hut, etc.) is really dreadful and tends to make > me sick. Good flour, cheese, tomatoes, garlic and olive oil is all > you really need. > > --Chuck > I once made my own Pizza at school. It wasn't bad, but I prefer to buy mine ready-made at the local shop and just heat it up. Oh, I don't like garlic either (so come and get me vampires!) I wonder if you could get a computer (or robot) to make the perfect pizza? (NB: definition of perfect varies with each person!) Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 18 17:21:47 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 22:21:47 +0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <24460148.1268944439526.JavaMail.root@elwamui-karabash.atl.sa.earthlink.net> References: <24460148.1268944439526.JavaMail.root@elwamui-karabash.atl.sa.earthlink.net> Message-ID: <4BA2A77B.8050505@philpem.me.uk> melamy at earthlink.net wrote: > if you want specs to programming microchip ics, go here... > > http://www.microchip.com/stellent/idcplg?IdcService=SS_GET_PAGE&nodeId=1407 I was under the impression that the FLASH specifications didn't cover the ICD hardware, but there you go... But they're handy anyway. I've got a Maplin PIC programmer kicking around somewhere -- the original software only programmed the 16C84, so I got Microchip to send me a copy of the Mid Range Reference Manual, the PIC16F84 Programming Specification and the 16F84 datasheet. Spent about two days writing an Intel HEX loader and PIC programmer engine in Turbo Pascal. Good fun... until someone gave me a copy of IC-PROG... Eh, it was a nice little learning exercise, at least. No idea if I've still got a copy of the code, probably lost it in a HDD crash sometime. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From brad at heeltoe.com Thu Mar 18 17:33:53 2010 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 18:33:53 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: (sfid-20100318_162837_065293_113910D8) References: (sfid-20100318_162837_065293_113910D8) Message-ID: <4BA2AA51.10100@heeltoe.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> But most JTAG debuggers allow for breakpoints/watches, register >> examination/alteration, single-step, etc. And there's at least one >> debug interface that uses a one-wire connection to the RESET pin, so >> you get to use all of the I/Os. >> > > Sure.. > > But there are several problems with that approach. The main one is that a > breakpoint is intrusive, it changes the behaviour of the system. Sorry to barge in, but I don't think is exactly correct. On most ARM systems these days, for example, there are multiple hardware breakpoints inside the jtag debug logic which are not intrusive. They don't perterb the instruction stream at all until they are hit. And, on some ARM SOC's there is an internal trace buffer which is also not intrusive, and is "free" in terms of timing (i.e. it doesn't slow anything down). Both have saved me a few times. -brad -- ----------- Brad Parker Heeltoe Consulting http://www.heeltoe.com 781-483-3101 From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 18 18:11:59 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 16:11:59 -0700 Subject: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering) In-Reply-To: <009401cac6e9$27d80ab0$f9fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> References: , <009401cac6e9$27d80ab0$f9fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <4BA250CF.19981.15E39F5@cclist.sydex.com> On 18 Mar 2010 at 21:55, Andrew Burton wrote: > I once made my own Pizza at school. It wasn't bad, but I prefer to buy > mine ready-made at the local shop and just heat it up. Oh, I don't > like garlic either (so come and get me vampires!) An old acquaintance used to say "Peppers make it spicy, but garlic makes it GOOD". > I wonder if you could get a computer (or robot) to make the perfect > pizza? (NB: definition of perfect varies with each person!) I think it's probably possible, but there are those of the serious bread clan who claim that kneading the dough by hand is absolutely necessary to incorporate the right amount of wild yeast (carried on the skin) to get the best bread. Anyone remember the short-lived high-tech venture to provide fresh- cooked vending-machine french fries ("chips" or "pommes frites")? --Chuck From spectre at floodgap.com Thu Mar 18 23:57:37 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 21:57:37 -0700 (PDT) Subject: testing it out was Re: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA2446D.20809.12DDAB8@cclist.sydex.com> from Chuck Guzis at "Mar 18, 10 03:19:09 pm" Message-ID: <201003190457.o2J4vbfT016582@floodgap.com> > You never want a programmer who knows how your application works to > be the one testing it, because he knows how it's *supposed* to work > and unconsciously focuses his texting within that context. I read a story once about a very determined game tester (I think it was for EA Sports) that insisted, while playing one of the Madden NFL games, to try to catch his own field goals. The programmers didn't think it was possible. He caught one, and the game locked up. The bug apparently became legendary in their QA department. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- FORTUNE: Good day for romance, but try a single person this time. ---------- From genedico at tampabay.rr.com Thu Mar 18 17:16:53 2010 From: genedico at tampabay.rr.com (Gene DiCostanzo) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 18:16:53 -0400 Subject: Computer Machinery Corporation? Message-ID: <84791A85CC504D0FA9D5645228F1743B@Gene> I just came across your question about CMC. My personal knowledge is that it was a competitor of my company in 1968 when it came out with a minicomputer-based system with multiple keyboards to replace IBM keypunch machines. Two of its competitors were Inforex and Honeywell. Another competitor at the time was Viatron but that company didn't last long. From jws at jwsss.com Thu Mar 18 17:27:42 2010 From: jws at jwsss.com (jim s) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2010 15:27:42 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA236F2.31961.F931A3@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4BA0F4C8.14696.211BBFF@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 17, 10 03:27:04 pm, <4BA236F2.31961.F931A3@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4BA2A8DE.9040602@jwsss.com> Arm core at least the arm 9 has a trace output option if you choose to bond out the controls. Without that, the bus may not tell you much about what the processor is doing. I understand that they attempted to implement a multicore solution, but I have not seen that implemented to study how it works. The multicore was for a later core than I was working with at the time I was doing an ARM debug product, but I had done the intel multi processor and multi core debuggers, and can see what a pain the breakpoint coordination was going to be for arm to implement. Their first try had so much skew it was useless. Intel has a solution that allows all cpu's to stop in a fashion that makes the stop useful, which is all I'll say w/o getting in trouble. The Arm stop as they ship it takes 32 or 33 jtag clocks to take affect, during which time the other cores would still be running at core speed, hence the skew. this is just one of the debugging issues you have. This stop issue applies if you are debugging other hardware and want to stop a processor or set of processors at the time of a transgression. Most bus speeds now are too fast to allow the analog circuitry to interject the trace probe into the bus and not kill the system. Again Intel has a solution that addresses that, but I don't know if it is available outside Intel or how. At ghz speeds it is difficult to do anything useful with the signals going by with a logic analyzer or with a circuit which has logic to create breakpoints, and then propagate the stop signal. And all processors have to have that logic, and coordinate stops properly. Debugger pods are still available for HP, but not for anything past a P3 or an Itanium 1. And HP did do a trace for the Itanium, which I have the head end to, but it was around 400 channels of preprocessing into a pile of 16700's. Jim On 3/18/2010 2:21 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 18 Mar 2010 at 19:33, Tony Duell wrote: > > >> And a logic analyser will tell you different things to a breakpoint. >> OK, at a breakpoint (if the debugging hardware is designed sensibly), >> you can exame CPU registers, etc. But it woun't necessarily tell you >> how the code got to the breakpoint. A logic analyser will/ >> > Hardly! Maybe on vintage CPUs, but not on anything made in the last > 20 years. Caching, prefetch queues, scheduling hardware and > integrated peripherals make a logic analyzer of marginal use in > debugging program flow. > > Times have changed and so have methods. For example, simulation is > used a lot more than it used to be for designs, as is on-chip > debugging support. > > --Chuck > > > From harrychandler1 at mac.com Thu Mar 18 21:11:12 2010 From: harrychandler1 at mac.com (Harry Chandler) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 02:11:12 -0000 Subject: Monroe calculating Machine Message-ID: <998F97BE-7987-46FF-BD83-FB7EA45378D0@mac.com> Do you still have the Monroe 8 N ? Harry Chandler Monroe Service Manager. From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to Fri Mar 19 10:38:57 2010 From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 10:38:57 -0500 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E In-Reply-To: References: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> <4BA02A96.9040101@compsys.to> <4BA1783C.9010507@compsys.to> <4BA273D1.8020904@compsys.to> Message-ID: <4BA39A91.8040207@compsys.to> Hi John, I am confused by some of your response to (b) and (c). Are you suggesting that because there are problems which occur in RT-11, but not in RSTS/E, the problems which occur in RT-11 should not be fixed? My goal is to provide a common utility which functions correctly under all OSs, not just RSTS/E or RT-11. TSX-PLUS has different issues as well. I can add code which solves the problems for RT-11, but since RSTS/E will likely be impacted, a few additional lines can prevent any impact on RSTS/E. As most programmers realize, when any changes are being made to a program, the additional effort of fixing other problems is much less than if done in a separate operation. >John A. Dundas III wrote: > At 1:41 PM -0500 3/18/10, Jerome H. Fine wrote: > >> >John A. Dundas III wrote: >> >>> Not sure why you need to change what MACRO/CREF are already doing; >>> they work as is under RSTS. If you're fixing a Y2k bug the file >>> chaining code, and for that matter the rest as well, works just as >>> well under RSTS as it does under RT. I would think the best >>> approach is not to change anything, unless it specifically addresses >>> a bug. >> >> >>> From my testing of MACRO / CREF under RT-11, there are 3 separate >>> problems, in addition to >> >> the lack of the 4 digit year when DEC added support for the years >> after 1999: >> >> (a) The DEC version of the MACRO / CREF pair can ONLY be located on >> the SY: device >> since the .Chain EMT request is hard coded to transfer control >> back and forth to each >> other using only files on the device SY:. No other utility >> program has that restriction. >> Note that this problem exists on all three operating systems: >> RSTS/E, TSX-PLUS and >> RT-11. > > > Well, under RSTS it's a little different. Under the hood, things are > set up so that CREF is chained to (and, e.g., MACRO returned to, > though CREF is not limited to talking to MACRO) when they exist in the > system ($) account. The $ account can span multiple physical disks. > Programs don't need to [explicitly] know about it, the OS finds it for > them. However $ maps to a single [PPN]. > > So I don't see this as a limitation. If MACRO and CREF are installed > normally, everything works as it's supposed to. The real "limitation" > that I am aware of is that you can't have MACRO chain to a private > version of CREF. Say you're working on a development version of > CREF. You need to write your own harness to exercise it; you can't > use the system version of MACRO, FOR, etc., to do that. > > >From the perspective of a (former) system manager, it's not a > problem. Remember, this is a multi-user timesharing system. Quite a > bit different from the RT audience. It sounds like anyone who worked on any development versions of the MACRO / CREF utilities had to do so on their own system or at hours when no one else was around to be bothered. At DEC, that was probably not much of a problem. For RT-11 systems which support essentially only one user at a time, it is also not much of a problem. On the other hand, I have worked with applications running under RT-11 which supported many tasks running at the same time all of which were both human and other computers - a total of 15 tasks of which 4 were for human interaction and 11 were other computers. Fortunately, all were via serial lines so that the processing demands were never that critical. Since it is rather easy to see the solution after it has been found, I agree that it might not have been apparent to the RT-11 developers. Of course, MACRO and CREF might not have been part of the RT-11 development team since I understand it was probably maintained under the RSTS/E group. In that case, maybe the need to keep it simple was the more important goal. Also, the RT-11 group may not have been concerned about the two problems with MACRO running under RT-11, or at least not sufficiently to consider doing anything about the problems. But then, I have all of the technical details worked out for a Logical Name Handler, LN(x).SYS, in RT-11 which will support a Logical Name Search List to allow multiple directories to be searched in RT-11, such as in the Logical Name List feature in VMS and the PATH NAME in DOS, although the latter is limited to executable files. Again, like with READ ONLY files under RT-11, why does such a standard feature which is available under RSTS/E not have the extra code in DIR to show which files are READ ONLY? Still, even if a few extra lines of code are required for the transfer of control back and forth via the .Chain command between MACRO and CREF as the contents of a command file are processed when one or both of MACRO or CREF are not on the SY: device, I can't see that as a huge problem based on the flexibility that provides. By the way, I can't think of any other program that uses CREF except MACRO? Do you know of any? And with so little code (less than 5 blocks including data areas), I would have thought that it would have been better to use CREF as an additional overlay in MACRO rather than all the effort of using the .Chain EMT to go back and forth. Probably the bare code required for an overlay within MACRO would be less than 4 blocks of code since there would not have been the need for any extra stuff for the .Chain EMTs or other code needed because of restarting the process. Since there are 3 overlay areas within MACRO, either of the other two could have been used without making MACRO itself any bigger. >> (b) Under RT-11, when running under a mapped operating system, if >> VBGEXE is used under > > There is no concept of VBGEXE under RSTS. MACRO can be used to > compile multiple files, in separate compiles (I think that's what > you're getting at), without reloading. Either way, again, this is not > a problem for a timesharing system. Multiple instances can be running > simultaneously, without problem. I am very aware that VBGEXE is not a concept under RSTS. On the other hand, once MACRO does a .Chain request to CREF, on the return .Chain to MACRO to continue the next compile, MACRO must be reloaded. In fact, that is what the .Chain EMT does, i.e. load and initiate a program. However, since only the root of MACRO is actually loaded to begin the process, the overhead in rather low in my opinion, so the net effect of reloading or not reloading is nothing to disagree about as far as consequences are concerned. So my pointing out that reloading of MACRO does take place due to separate compiles is not to point out a problem, but rather to correct the record of how MACRO / CREF operate, namely, CREF does not terminate after it completes the cross-reference tables, but always does a .Chain EMT request back to the caller. On RT-11 under an unmapped monitor (which is how RSTS runs for RT-11 programs), that is never a problem and it is a valid method of transferring control from CREF back to MACRO. In fact, as far as my testing shows, even if the user command files has a separate RUN MACRO command for each new compile, MACRO gets reloaded again just before it terminates with no additional work to do when it finds no more separate compiles to perform. So repeated RUN MACRO commands in a command file result in MACRO being reloaded twice for every subsequent compile. Again, the number of blocks of disk access involved are too low to be of concern, so this is not a disagreement. >> (c) Under RT-11, when running MACRO.SAV as a system job, VBGEXE is >> required to >> load into extended memory (64K in size) and initiate MACRO.SAV; >> however, if a >> cross-reference table is requested, the .Chain EMT will cause >> the job to abort with >> the complete loss of the listing file. > > A non-issue with RSTS. I understand, RSTS does not have the concept of system jobs. But RT-11 does and executing the .Chain request aborts the system job. >> As it happens, according to the PDF that you suggested that I look >> at, the .SaveStatus >> EMT request under RSTS/E returns the device name of the file in >> question - as opposed >> to the RT-11 values which are totally different. However, since >> there is no specific mention >> of the .CStatus EMT request in the PDF as to what happens if used >> under RSTS/E (the >> most probable result is that the .CStatus EMT request will be ignored >> under RSTS/E), then >> program control will be used to solve if RSTS/E is being used vs >> RT-11 when MACRO.SAV >> is found to be executing under an unmapped monitor. This is because >> the third word of the >> data block returned by RSTS/E for the .SaveStatus EMT request will be >> 6544 decimal >> (RAD50 "RO" = 12620 octal = 4096+2048+384+16) which is very different >> from the size >> of MACRO.SAV (about 100 blocks) which is the value found in the third >> word under >> RT-11,. I found this information in the PDF on pages 6-10 and 7-57. > > I'm not following where there is a problem, but OK. I am saying that there is a solution!!!!!!!!! The .SaveStatus information provided by RSTS provides the device name which the .CStatus information provided by RT-11 supplies. The initial question was how to determine which EMT request to use. I will attempt to explain again why the .SaveStatus EMT request results are sufficiently different between RSTS and RT-11 if on reading my explanation again you still don't understand. What I still don't know is how RSTS handles the .CStatus RT-11 EMT request. Would you be able to run a small test program under RSTS for me to determine that question. Or is there a downloadable RSTS image available that can run RSTS under SIMH available that I can use to test it myself? >> There is also a final question about the information in the PDF on >> page 6-16 which states >> that bit 5 of offset 300 will always be zero. Are there no RSTS/E >> systems running where >> the power is 50 Hz rather than 60 Hz? Unless this omission has been >> corrected, but the >> documentation has not been updated? Otherwise, the TIME printed on >> the listing from >> MACRO.SAV will be incorrect if run under a 50 Hz system. Likewise >> for other programs >> which check bit 5 in offset 300 (the .GVal EMT request) and attempt >> to convert ticks to >> the time. > > Yes, RSTS runs on 50Hz systems, no problem, though I've never > personally done it. All I know is that RSTS attempts to present the > time value in a format RT expects (as it keeps time different > internally from RT). Maybe the ticks value IS wrong. Is it every > displayed? I just don't remember whether MACRO uses that in its > listings or not. Based on your explanation and the documentation in the PDF on page 6-16, my assumption is that RSTS converts all time quantities to ticks based on a 60 Hz clock. So even if the actual hardware is running at 50 Hz, the conversion into ticks to satisfy the .GTim EMT request does so based on a 60 Hz clock. Otherwise, the time of day at the top of each page in the listing would be noticeably less than the correct time near the end of the day, i.e. too few ticks would be calculated. > A review of the source code for an older version of the emulator > suggests that the 50/60Hz bit (5) is always set to 0. Oh well. Reasonable as long as the conversion of the correct time to ticks for the RT-11 program is done at 60 Hz. > There is one other discrepancy between the documentation and the > source: evidently bit 15 (system clock presence) DOES get set, always, > contrary to what is written in the manual. Under RT-11, that states that there IS a system clock while bit 5 being zero states that the frequency is 60 Hz. So everything is CORRECT after all!!! Please let me know if you can run a small RT-11 program under RSTS to print the contents of the information provided by the .CStatus EMT request? More specifically, it would also show if there is an error returned or if RSTS just ignores the request but leaves the data block unchanged. What I would probably do is set the overlaid bit in the JSW in word 44 of block zero of the program, then execute the EMTs for channel 17: .SaveStatus .ReOpen .CStatus in that order in case RSTS aborts the program when the .CStatus EMT request is executed. If RSTS just ignores the .CStatus EMT request and returns success, but leaves the data block unchanged, then it will be trivial to determine that RSTS is running rather than RT-11. Jerome Fine From trebor77 at execpc.com Fri Mar 19 12:12:44 2010 From: trebor77 at execpc.com (Robert J. Stevens) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 11:12:44 -0600 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> Message-ID: <4BA3B08C.70409@execpc.com> I have a set of the Steve Ciarcia Circuit Cellar Magazines if Anyone is Interested Volume I originally cost $8.00 Volume II originally cost $12.95 Volume III originally cost $16.95 Volume IV originally cost $18.95 WOW Make an Offer Bob in Wisconsin USE below minus spaces trebor 7 7 @execpc.com From geneb at deltasoft.com Fri Mar 19 11:50:57 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 09:50:57 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <4BA3B08C.70409@execpc.com> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> <4BA3B08C.70409@execpc.com> Message-ID: On Fri, 19 Mar 2010, Robert J. Stevens wrote: > I have a set of the Steve Ciarcia Circuit Cellar Magazines if Anyone is > Interested > Volume I originally cost $8.00 > Volume II originally cost $12.95 > Volume III originally cost $16.95 > Volume IV originally cost $18.95 > WOW Wow? You forgot L@@K!!!111 RARE!!!1111! g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From dundas at caltech.edu Fri Mar 19 11:54:44 2010 From: dundas at caltech.edu (John A. Dundas III) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 09:54:44 -0700 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E In-Reply-To: <4BA39A91.8040207@compsys.to> References: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> <4BA02A96.9040101@compsys.to> <4BA1783C.9010507@compsys.to> <4BA273D1.8020904@compsys.to> <4BA39A91.8040207@compsys.to> Message-ID: At 10:38 AM -0500 3/19/10, Jerome H. Fine wrote: >I am confused by some of your response to (b) and (c). Are you >suggesting that >because there are problems which occur in RT-11, but not in RSTS/E, >the problems >which occur in RT-11 should not be fixed? Definitely not. I am trying to point out where things that might be a problem in RT are not necessarily a problem in RSTS, though. >My goal is to provide a common utility which functions correctly >under all OSs, >not just RSTS/E or RT-11. TSX-PLUS has different issues as well. I can >add code which solves the problems for RT-11, but since RSTS/E will likely >be impacted, a few additional lines can prevent any impact on RSTS/E. As >most programmers realize, when any changes are being made to a program, >the additional effort of fixing other problems is much less than if done in a >separate operation. Maybe. My approach would be to strictly limit (minimize) the amount of change to that which is absolutely necessary to correct the defect, thus minimizing the possibility of unintended consequences. I don't know that that's necessarily different from your approach, maybe just a different way of stating it. >Still, even if a few extra lines of code are required for the >transfer of control back and forth >via the .Chain command between MACRO and CREF as the contents of a >command file >are processed when one or both of MACRO or CREF are not on the SY: >device, I can't >see that as a huge problem based on the flexibility that provides. All I'm saying is that this already works correctly under RSTS. Caution should be exercised to not break what already works. I know you're cautious. >By the way, I can't think of any other program that uses CREF except >MACRO? Do >you know of any? Sure. Could the linker and Fortran compilers could optionally use it? [My memory is a bit hazy.] Other compilers did use it: BP2 [see the /CROSS_REFERENCE switch], Pascal?, C [see the /CR switch], Cobol [see the /CROSS_REFERENCE switch], and maybe other compilers used it as well. I know many user-written utilities, including some of my own, used it as it was a well documented interface. >compile. Again, the number of blocks of disk access involved are too low >to be of concern, so this is not a disagreement. OK. I'm not trying to disagree, just putting facts out there. >What I still don't know is how RSTS handles the .CStatus RT-11 EMT request. >Would you be able to run a small test program under RSTS for me to determine >that question. Or is there a downloadable RSTS image available that can run >RSTS under SIMH available that I can use to test it myself? Yes. See the SIMH software site: >>>There is also a final question about the information in the PDF on >>>page 6-16 which states >>>that bit 5 of offset 300 will always be zero. Are there no RSTS/E >>>systems running where >>>the power is 50 Hz rather than 60 Hz? Unless this omission has >>>been corrected, but the >>>documentation has not been updated? Otherwise, the TIME printed >>>on the listing from >>>MACRO.SAV will be incorrect if run under a 50 Hz system. Likewise >>>for other programs >>>which check bit 5 in offset 300 (the .GVal EMT request) and >>>attempt to convert ticks to >>>the time. >> >>Yes, RSTS runs on 50Hz systems, no problem, though I've never >>personally done it. All I know is that RSTS attempts to present >>the time value in a format RT expects (as it keeps time different >>internally from RT). Maybe the ticks value IS wrong. Is it every >>displayed? I just don't remember whether MACRO uses that in its >>listings or not. > >Based on your explanation and the documentation in the PDF on page 6-16, my >assumption is that RSTS converts all time quantities to ticks based on a 60 Hz >clock. So even if the actual hardware is running at 50 Hz, the >conversion into >ticks to satisfy the .GTim EMT request does so based on a 60 Hz clock. I can't say that for certain. .GTIM will return a "reasonable" value. >Otherwise, the time of day at the top of each page in the listing would be >noticeably less than the correct time near the end of the day, i.e. >too few ticks >would be calculated. No. The .GTIM value is recomputed each time it is requested. The emulator performs a .DATE request to RSTS and then converts the values into RT-11-expected quantities each time it is called. IF there is a conversion error, it is more or less constant. >Please let me know if you can run a small RT-11 program under RSTS to >print the contents of the information provided by the .CStatus EMT request? You can perform this yourself with the software referenced above. According to the code .CSTATUS merely returns immediately to the calling program without doing anything. Hope this helps, John From mcguire at neurotica.com Fri Mar 19 12:05:18 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 13:05:18 -0400 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <4BA3B08C.70409@execpc.com> References: <4B8BD43C.7020100@execpc.com> <4BA3B08C.70409@execpc.com> Message-ID: <2C8AA3F6-864D-4777-A584-466024E6A276@neurotica.com> On Mar 19, 2010, at 1:12 PM, Robert J. Stevens wrote: > I have a set of the Steve Ciarcia Circuit Cellar Magazines if > Anyone is Interested > Volume I originally cost $8.00 > Volume II originally cost $12.95 > Volume III originally cost $16.95 > Volume IV originally cost $18.95 > WOW Wow indeed. Are these in fact "Circuit Cellar Ink" magazines, or are they the compendium of Ciarcia's Circuit Cellar columns from BYTE magazine? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From curt at atarimuseum.com Fri Mar 19 13:01:27 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 14:01:27 -0400 Subject: Tandem, DEC & IBM lot of equipment on Epay.... In-Reply-To: <201003190457.o2J4vbfT016582@floodgap.com> References: <201003190457.o2J4vbfT016582@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <4BA3BBF7.50007@atarimuseum.com> Ran across this while looking at some other stuff from the seller: http://cgi.ebay.com/ASSORTED-SURPLUS-COMPUTER-EQUIPMENT-BY-CATEGORY_W0QQitemZ270336632917QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item3ef151a855 Big lot of stuff, says Local Pickup - he is in Oklahoma. Curt From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Fri Mar 19 13:45:55 2010 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 11:45:55 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Tandem, DEC & IBM lot of equipment on Epay.... In-Reply-To: <4BA3BBF7.50007@atarimuseum.com> References: <201003190457.o2J4vbfT016582@floodgap.com> <4BA3BBF7.50007@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: On Fri, 19 Mar 2010, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Ran across this while looking at some other stuff from the seller: > > http://cgi.ebay.com/ASSORTED-SURPLUS-COMPUTER-EQUIPMENT-BY-CATEGORY_W0QQitemZ270336632917QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item3ef151a855 > > Big lot of stuff, says Local Pickup - he is in Oklahoma. Hmm... A forklift and two 19th century pianos. Whee! -- 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 jdr_use at bluewin.ch Fri Mar 19 14:10:34 2010 From: jdr_use at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 20:10:34 +0100 Subject: Just another homebuilt TTL machine Message-ID: <4BA3CC2A.2030908@bluewin.ch> I have put online some pictures and schematics of a rather pathetic homebuilt TTL machine I constructed around 1985 Specs 12 bit wide, 8K ram, 256 word hardware stack. CPU 3 x 74181 Hardcoded instruction set. No blinkenlights, but, almost as good, 4 nixies as display. Since I just cannot be bothered to make a proper homepage, I have just put everyting on my FTP server. Find the goodies here : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/T3 Jos Dreesen From julianskidmore at yahoo.com Fri Mar 19 04:20:37 2010 From: julianskidmore at yahoo.com (Julian Skidmore) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 02:20:37 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Disc analyser news update Message-ID: <547563.9385.qm@web111715.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Hi folks, > melamy at earthlink.net wrote: > > if you want specs to programming microchip ics, go here... > > > > http://www.microchip.com/stellent/idcplgIdcService=SS_GET_PAGE&nodeId=1407 > I was under the impression that the FLASH specifications didn't cover > the ICD hardware, but there you go... > But they're handy anyway. I've got a Maplin PIC programmer kicking > around somewhere -- the original software only programmed the 16C84 Despite the horrors of programming PICs; they do have at least one redeeming feature here - they're genuine classic architectures, being designed in the mid-70s for General Instruments ;-) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PIC_microcontroller#History -cheers from julz @P From csquared3 at tx.rr.com Fri Mar 19 09:08:02 2010 From: csquared3 at tx.rr.com (CSquared) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 09:08:02 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA38542.70803@tx.rr.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> I've done a bit of that too over the years, just a few motors but more >> transformers. One thing that has always troubled me is the usual poor > > I;ve done trasnformers too, but fortunately I've never had to do one that > had to stand main voltage or similar. I've done the high voltage winding a time or two, which I think usually is immediately atop the mains primary winding. > >> condition of what I believe is at least sometimes called the "fish >> paper" used to provide extra insulation between the coating on the wires > > I've certainly heard it called 'fish paper' over here. I am not sure if > you can still buy it anywhere, if you can, I am looking for a source... If I find one I'll try to remember to let you know. I must admit I've never looked very hard, partly because it always seems to be somewhat formed to a shape that I don't know I could duplicate. I wonder if it is essentially flat when installed and then sort of sets into the ultimate shape. > >> and the stator/armature/core metal. Back in my younger more foolish >> days I'm afraid I was sometimes guilty of using ordinary card stock as a >> solution, though I've wondered if that is not a bit of a fire hazard in > > Well, it probably is eeasier to ignite than fishpaper, but normal paper > is not that easy to set on firs. A soldering iron won't do it, for > example. If a transformer is getting hot enough to ignite paper, you have > problems. Yes, I agree - that was what I meant by the reference to Ray Bradbury's SF book. I believe the 451 degrees F to be fairly accurate. I think the paint on the outside would be bubbling at that temperature! > > My greater worry would be that the paper may absorb moisture and > electrically break down.At one time paper soaked in wax was used, but > this would seem to be an even greater fire risk. Hmmm, yes, I would think so too. > >> spite of "Fahrenheit 451". I'd just be interested in hearing your >> thoughts on this issue. > > I'd probably not do it in something that was going to be used by somebody > else, or somethign that was going to run unattended. I might do it for > something I was goping to use myself. I believe all of this I've ever done with mains voltages involved has been for my own, very intermittent use. Now that I think about it, I did do some audio transformers in a car radio many years ago. It's been so long I don't recall what issues I may have had with those. > > -tony > From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 19 13:44:06 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:44:06 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <20100318131530.GI3420@n0jcf.net> from "Chris Elmquist" at Mar 18, 10 08:15:30 am Message-ID: > > On Thursday (03/18/2010 at 12:06AM +0000), Philip Pemberton wrote: > > > > You know, there is a reason Microchip released the ICD2, ICD3 and > > PICKit2 Debug Express. All of the three support in-circuit debugging > > over the programming pins -- set a code breakpoint (or watchpoint), wait > > for it to trigger, then dump the program state. > > And do those debugger tools run on any OS other than Windows? Not that I could see. And the specs that I was pointed to by some chap here give details on programming the PICs, but nothing on the debugger commands, so it appers you can't write your own debugging tools. > > > Beats the LEDs-and-switches debugging method, or the "hook a terminal > > up" trick... > > If the answer to the above is No, then it does not beat the "hook a > terminal up" trick... or an LED trick or plenty of other tricks... > not by a long shot. Exactly. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 19 13:48:50 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:48:50 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA236F2.31961.F931A3@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 18, 10 02:21:38 pm Message-ID: > > On 18 Mar 2010 at 19:33, Tony Duell wrote: > > > And a logic analyser will tell you different things to a breakpoint. > > OK, at a breakpoint (if the debugging hardware is designed sensibly), > > you can exame CPU registers, etc. But it woun't necessarily tell you > > how the code got to the breakpoint. A logic analyser will/ > > Hardly! Maybe on vintage CPUs, but not on anything made in the last > 20 years. Caching, prefetch queues, scheduling hardware and > integrated peripherals make a logic analyzer of marginal use in > debugging program flow. I am talking about microcontrollers, not desktop computer CPUs... If it's genuinely the case that the exact behavious or the device is that hard to predict, it makes them useless for just about any application that I would want to use them for, which generally depend on changing external signals with precisely known timing. > > Times have changed and so have methods. For example, simulation is You say that as though it's a Good Thing. Personally, I can't think of any change in the last 20 years that's actually made life better for me. > used a lot more than it used to be for designs, as is on-chip > debugging support. I've had too many bad experiences of simulators to trust them. I've yet to meet a digital logic simulatoor that gets my test circuits right... And it's very hard to simulate a microntroller when you're using it to interface to some other large and complex system which you somehow have to include in the simulator. On-chip debugging support would be great if it was documented. It appears not to be, at least not for PiCs. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 19 14:06:04 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 19:06:04 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM In-Reply-To: <8A7C340645D344C1A802328771245D8E@xp1800> from "Rik Bos" at Mar 18, 10 10:40:23 pm Message-ID: > > > > I aquired a HP 2671A thermal printer and know that there should be an > upgrade ROM to 'upgrade' it to a HP 2671G. > Thanks to Tony excelent work on HPCC CDROM i have the schematics and was > able to fix the head positioning circuit. > One of the driver transistors (TIP 122) was bad after replacing it and > cleaning the printer it works fine. You will find it prints on thermal fax paper without problems. But get the 216mm wide stuff. I got some 210mm rolls and found it would print on them without snagging the papepr if oyu got it positioned just right. I turned a cuuple of brass spacers, but it's a lot less work to get the right width paper. > But now I want to use it for printing graphics (diagrams) and would be very > happy whith an image of the graphics ROM. If you like I can pull the cover on my 2671G and see what the 3 programmed devices (2 8049 microcontrollers and a ROM) are labelled, and the setting fo the EA pin switches on each of the boards (to see if the 8049 is using its intenal ROM). That will indicate what needs to be replaced in your machine.... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 19 14:51:43 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 19:51:43 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA2AA51.10100@heeltoe.com> from "Brad Parker" at Mar 18, 10 06:33:53 pm Message-ID: > Sorry to barge in, but I don't think is exactly correct. On most ARM > systems these days, for > example, there are multiple hardware breakpoints inside the jtag debug > logic which are > not intrusive. They don't perterb the instruction stream at all until > they are hit. > No, you misunderstood me. A breakpoint is intrusive in that when it is hit it stps the code execution (There are plenty of other debugging feautrs in some chip,s but they're not strictly breakpoints). For tyhe sort of thing I would use a microcontroller for (which involves generating precisely timed signals to control external hardware) I can't have my progrma suddenly being stopped for the debugger. A logic analyser will grabe state and not stop the program running. > And, on some ARM SOC's there is an internal trace buffer which is also > not intrusive, > and is "free" in terms of timing (i.e. it doesn't slow anything down). > > Both have saved me a few times. Do any of these processors have the debugging commands _to the chip_ 100% docuemtned so that I could write my own debugging software to run on $classic_computer? THe PCs don't appear to... -tony From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Fri Mar 19 15:06:50 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:06:50 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA38542.70803@tx.rr.com> References: ,<4BA38542.70803@tx.rr.com> Message-ID: > Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 09:08:02 -0500 > From: csquared3 at tx.rr.com > To: > Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > CC: cctalk at classiccmp.org > > Tony Duell wrote: > >> I've done a bit of that too over the years, just a few motors but more > >> transformers. One thing that has always troubled me is the usual poor > > > > I;ve done trasnformers too, but fortunately I've never had to do one that > > had to stand main voltage or similar. > I've done the high voltage winding a time or two, which I think usually > is immediately atop the mains primary winding. > > > >> condition of what I believe is at least sometimes called the "fish > >> paper" used to provide extra insulation between the coating on the wires > > > > I've certainly heard it called 'fish paper' over here. I am not sure if > > you can still buy it anywhere, if you can, I am looking for a source... > If I find one I'll try to remember to let you know. I must admit I've > never looked very hard, partly because it always seems to be somewhat > formed to a shape that I don't know I could duplicate. I wonder if it > is essentially flat when installed and then sort of sets into the > ultimate shape. > > > >> and the stator/armature/core metal. Back in my younger more foolish > >> days I'm afraid I was sometimes guilty of using ordinary card stock as a > >> solution, though I've wondered if that is not a bit of a fire hazard in > > > > Well, it probably is eeasier to ignite than fishpaper, but normal paper > > is not that easy to set on firs. A soldering iron won't do it, for > > example. If a transformer is getting hot enough to ignite paper, you have > > problems. > Yes, I agree - that was what I meant by the reference to Ray Bradbury's > SF book. I believe the 451 degrees F to be fairly accurate. I think > the paint on the outside would be bubbling at that temperature! > > > > My greater worry would be that the paper may absorb moisture and > > electrically break down.At one time paper soaked in wax was used, but > > this would seem to be an even greater fire risk. > Hmmm, yes, I would think so too. > > > >> spite of "Fahrenheit 451". I'd just be interested in hearing your > >> thoughts on this issue. > > > > I'd probably not do it in something that was going to be used by somebody > > else, or somethign that was going to run unattended. I might do it for > > something I was goping to use myself. > I believe all of this I've ever done with mains voltages involved has > been for my own, very intermittent use. Now that I think about it, I > did do some audio transformers in a car radio many years ago. It's been > so long I don't recall what issues I may have had with those. > > > > -tony > > > Antique Electronic Supply has your fish paper S-M5609, $5.25 for a 9" roll (250 sq in) www.tubesandmore.com Randy _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail is redefining busy with tools for the New Busy. Get more from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_2 From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Fri Mar 19 13:28:10 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:28:10 -0000 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC References: , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <020701cac7a0$b1079780$7c2a5f0a@user8459cef6fa> and how much of that $240,000 did you see? (I hope I'm not overstepping any bounderies) Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk ----- Original Message ----- From: "Randy Dawson" To: "classic computers" Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 2:34 AM Subject: RE: great abandonware for your classic PC Er, Fred, I write software too, I wrote the first ever multimedia program for the PC in DOS and Windows, the roller coster simulator COASTER. (realtime fractal video decompression, with audio) First months sales $240,000, in 1994 Outsold Lotus 123. So don't put me in the 'those of you', I'm in the those of us. Randy > Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 19:20:32 -0700 > From: cisin at xenosoft.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > > On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > > You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. > > All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 > > Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab > > Graphics like Dr. Halo > > Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal > > http://vetusware.com > > There is NO abandonware anywhere on that site. EVERYTHING there is > illegal copies for piracy. > > Those of us who make a living writing software do not condone unauthorized > distribution of copyrighted works. _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail has tools for the New Busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_1= From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Fri Mar 19 13:01:28 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:01:28 -0000 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC References: Message-ID: <020601cac7a0$aef55950$7c2a5f0a@user8459cef6fa> Which is funny why they haven't shut it down if it's been up for several years, if not longer. Big companies usually squash bugs (not that kind of bug!) quickly when copyright infringement occurs, with a big team of lawyers. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk ----- Original Message ----- From: "Zane H. Healy" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 2:56 AM Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > Sounds more like pirated software than abandonware. Most of those > are products from some very active, and very big companies. > > Zane > > > > At 8:45 PM -0500 3/16/10, Randy Dawson wrote: > >You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. > > > >All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 > >Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab > >Graphics like Dr. Halo > >Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal > > > > > >http://vetusware.com > > > >Randy > > -- > | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | > | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | > | | 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 aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Fri Mar 19 13:33:33 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:33:33 -0000 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC References: <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net><20100316200725.T70534@shell.lmi.net> <201003170421.o2H4LSQC097250@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <020801cac7a0$b30451e0$7c2a5f0a@user8459cef6fa> > > At 04:06 PM 3/10/2007, Randy Dawson wrote: > >I have Stardent (Kubota) Dore' running today and porting my old app to it. > >I wrote the PC roller coaster simulator, COASTER. I want to re-spin it, now that fast GPU hardware has finaly arrived and in every PC. > > So you're handing out the source to the old one, but writing a new one? > > - John > That's how I work too. Whenever I release new software, I always include the source to the last software I wrote. I don't like to include the source with the software when it's is released, as someone could come along, change the credits and then become famous with *my* work. Ok, chances are it won't happen, but I'm still not going to take that risk. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From melamy at earthlink.net Fri Mar 19 15:26:03 2010 From: melamy at earthlink.net (melamy at earthlink.net) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:26:03 -0400 (EDT) Subject: Disc analyser news update Message-ID: <31375483.1269030363507.JavaMail.root@elwamui-norfolk.atl.sa.earthlink.net> go here then... http://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/DeviceDoc/51242a.pdf that will at least give you debugging information that Microchip released. Steve "some chap" Thatcher -----Original Message----- >From: Tony Duell >Sent: Mar 19, 2010 2:44 PM >To: cctalk at classiccmp.org >Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > >> >> On Thursday (03/18/2010 at 12:06AM +0000), Philip Pemberton wrote: >> > >> > You know, there is a reason Microchip released the ICD2, ICD3 and >> > PICKit2 Debug Express. All of the three support in-circuit debugging >> > over the programming pins -- set a code breakpoint (or watchpoint), wait >> > for it to trigger, then dump the program state. >> >> And do those debugger tools run on any OS other than Windows? > >Not that I could see. And the specs that I was pointed to by some chap >here give details on programming the PICs, but nothing on the debugger >commands, so it appers you can't write your own debugging tools. > >> >> > Beats the LEDs-and-switches debugging method, or the "hook a terminal >> > up" trick... >> >> If the answer to the above is No, then it does not beat the "hook a >> terminal up" trick... or an LED trick or plenty of other tricks... >> not by a long shot. > >Exactly. > >-tony From cclist at sydex.com Fri Mar 19 15:36:30 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 13:36:30 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: <4BA236F2.31961.F931A3@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 18, 10 02:21:38 pm, Message-ID: <4BA37DDE.1383.173664E@cclist.sydex.com> On 19 Mar 2010 at 18:48, Tony Duell wrote: > I am talking about microcontrollers, not desktop computer CPUs... Have you looked at some of the high-end microcontrollers lately? > You say that as though it's a Good Thing. Personally, I can't think of > any change in the last 20 years that's actually made life better for > me. My favorite tool is an oscillograph, but I can't get the galvanometer to move at a couple hundred MHz. Those funny "cathode ray" variations are just too leading-edge for me. Time marches on and I choose to march with it, but I acknowledge that everyone is different. --Chuck From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Fri Mar 19 15:45:25 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 21:45:25 +0100 Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM In-Reply-To: References: <8A7C340645D344C1A802328771245D8E@xp1800> from "Rik Bos" at Mar18, 10 10:40:23 pm Message-ID: <59B4CB9ADCCB42D38926D062250FC97E@xp1800> > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Tony Duell > Verzonden: vrijdag 19 maart 2010 20:06 > Aan: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Onderwerp: Re: HP 2671 Graphics ROM > > > > > > > > > I aquired a HP 2671A thermal printer and know that there > should be > > an upgrade ROM to 'upgrade' it to a HP 2671G. > > Thanks to Tony excelent work on HPCC CDROM i have the > schematics and > > was able to fix the head positioning circuit. > > One of the driver transistors (TIP 122) was bad after > replacing it and > > cleaning the printer it works fine. > > You will find it prints on thermal fax paper without > problems. But get the 216mm wide stuff. I got some 210mm > rolls and found it would print on them without snagging the > papepr if oyu got it positioned just right. I turned a cuuple > of brass spacers, but it's a lot less work to get the right > width paper. > > > But now I want to use it for printing graphics (diagrams) > and would be > > very happy whith an image of the graphics ROM. > > If you like I can pull the cover on my 2671G and see what the > 3 programmed devices (2 8049 microcontrollers and a ROM) are > labelled, and the setting fo the EA pin switches on each of > the boards (to see if the > 8049 is using its intenal ROM). That will indicate what needs > to be replaced in your machine.... > > -tony Thanks , HP was talking about adding a graphics chip (ROM). The 2671 has an empty socket on the HP-IB interface board, the one closest to the printer PCB is empty. I'm not sure if that's the one, it could be the ROM on the printer PCB it self. It would be very nice if you find out what needs to be replaced, on the printer PCB on the one I have a 8039 with external ROM is used. I've a stach of 216mm wide fax paper from a fax I owned . -Rik From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 19 15:54:38 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 20:54:38 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA37DDE.1383.173664E@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 19, 10 01:36:30 pm Message-ID: > > On 19 Mar 2010 at 18:48, Tony Duell wrote: > > > I am talking about microcontrollers, not desktop computer CPUs... > > Have you looked at some of the high-end microcontrollers lately? Err no. At one time we had these wonderful things called 'data books' I'd flip through them to see what chips were available, their featurs, etc. I bought a lot of said books. Now I am expected to get data from the manufacturer's web site. I can't 'flip throuugh' a web site like I could the data book. Oh, the web sites are great if I want data on a partioclar device, but not as good if you just want to see what's avaialbe. And no, the 'product selector' pages never seem to tell me what I need to know... However, I stnad by what I said. For the sort of applications I have in mind for microcontroller,s knowing exaclty how long they will take to execute each instruction is vital. I guess there are still some for which that is the case... > > > You say that as though it's a Good Thing. Personally, I can't think of > > any change in the last 20 years that's actually made life better for > > me. > > My favorite tool is an oscillograph, but I can't get the galvanometer I once used an instrument that claimed to be a 'cathode ray oscillograph'... > to move at a couple hundred MHz. Those funny "cathode ray" > variations are just too leading-edge for me. Err, considering the CRT is about 106 years old now, I have little problem with it. > > Time marches on and I choose to march with it, but I acknowledge that > everyone is different. I see no reason to change if what I am using is doing the job I require it to do. And I certainly no reason to change if the modern replacement is inferior (to me) that what it would replace. So I stick to my statemet. I can't think of anything new in the last 20 years that's improved my life. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 19 16:07:33 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 21:07:33 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM In-Reply-To: <59B4CB9ADCCB42D38926D062250FC97E@xp1800> from "Rik Bos" at Mar 19, 10 09:45:25 pm Message-ID: > Thanks , HP was talking about adding a graphics chip (ROM). My printer -- the one the schematics were produced from -- is a 2671G. > The 2671 has an empty socket on the HP-IB interface board, the one closest > to the printer PCB is empty. I think mine does too. I am pretty sure I indicated that the external ROM for that microcontroller was 'N/F' (meaning 'Not Fitted'). You could use a 8039 microcnotrller and an extenal ROM or an 8049. One of the switches on the itnerface board sets the state of the EA pin > I'm not sure if that's the one, it could be the ROM on the printer PCB it > self. I am also almost certain that my printer PCB has an external ROM. I think it's an 8049 microcnnotroller on there too. Again, I would have to check the settings of the swithes to see if the interal ROM of that microcontroller is used). Of course an 8049 with EA pulled hich acts just like an 8039 AFAIK. > It would be very nice if you find out what needs to be replaced, on the > printer PCB on the one I have a 8039 with external ROM is used. I should have some time tomorrow to pull the covers and check. We can compare our 2 machines to see jsut what the differences are. -tony From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Fri Mar 19 16:29:50 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 22:29:50 +0100 Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM In-Reply-To: References: <59B4CB9ADCCB42D38926D062250FC97E@xp1800> from "Rik Bos" at Mar19, 10 09:45:25 pm Message-ID: <961F34038CE248AB930C0CDD2FB21F2C@xp1800> > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Tony Duell > Verzonden: vrijdag 19 maart 2010 22:08 > Aan: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Onderwerp: Re: HP 2671 Graphics ROM > > > Thanks , HP was talking about adding a graphics chip (ROM). > > My printer -- the one the schematics were produced from -- is > a 2671G. > > > The 2671 has an empty socket on the HP-IB interface board, the one > > closest to the printer PCB is empty. > > I think mine does too. I am pretty sure I indicated that the > external ROM for that microcontroller was 'N/F' (meaning 'Not > Fitted'). You could use a 8039 microcnotrller and an extenal > ROM or an 8049. One of the switches on the itnerface board > sets the state of the EA pin > > > I'm not sure if that's the one, it could be the ROM on the > printer PCB > > it self. > > I am also almost certain that my printer PCB has an external > ROM. I think it's an 8049 microcnnotroller on there too. > Again, I would have to check the settings of the swithes to > see if the interal ROM of that microcontroller is used). Of > course an 8049 with EA pulled hich acts just like an 8039 AFAIK. > > > It would be very nice if you find out what needs to be replaced, on > > the printer PCB on the one I have a 8039 with external ROM is used. > > I should have some time tomorrow to pull the covers and > check. We can compare our 2 machines to see jsut what the > differences are. > > -tony Seems a good idea, I'll write down the part numbers so we can compare. -Rik From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Fri Mar 19 16:35:33 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:35:33 -0500 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC In-Reply-To: <020701cac7a0$b1079780$7c2a5f0a@user8459cef6fa> References: , , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <020701cac7a0$b1079780$7c2a5f0a@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: Andrew, I got 60K first month, 30K next month, then 20, 10 5 and zero. I was part of the screen saver fad, and it was all over in 6 months. Randy > From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:28:10 +0000 > > > and how much of that $240,000 did you see? (I hope I'm not overstepping any > bounderies) > > > Regards, > Andrew B > aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Randy Dawson" > To: "classic computers" > Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 2:34 AM > Subject: RE: great abandonware for your classic PC > > > > Er, Fred, > > I write software too, I wrote the first ever multimedia program for the PC > in DOS and Windows, the roller coster simulator COASTER. (realtime fractal > video decompression, with audio) > > First months sales $240,000, in 1994 > > Outsold Lotus 123. > > So don't put me in the 'those of you', > > I'm in the those of us. > > Randy > > > Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 19:20:32 -0700 > > From: cisin at xenosoft.com > > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > > Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > > > > On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > > > You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. > > > All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 > > > Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab > > > Graphics like Dr. Halo > > > Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal > > > http://vetusware.com > > > > There is NO abandonware anywhere on that site. EVERYTHING there is > > illegal copies for piracy. > > > > Those of us who make a living writing software do not condone unauthorized > > distribution of copyrighted works. > > _________________________________________________________________ > Hotmail has tools for the New Busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. > http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_1= > _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Trusted email with powerful SPAM protection. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/210850553/direct/01/ From thrashbarg at kaput.homeunix.org Fri Mar 19 17:04:52 2010 From: thrashbarg at kaput.homeunix.org (Alexis) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 08:34:52 +1030 Subject: Just another homebuilt TTL machine In-Reply-To: <4BA3CC2A.2030908@bluewin.ch> References: <4BA3CC2A.2030908@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <201003200834.52219.thrashbarg@kaput.homeunix.org> On Sat, 20 Mar 2010 05:40:34 am Jos Dreesen wrote: > I have put online some pictures and schematics of a rather pathetic > homebuilt TTL machine I constructed around 1985 > Pathetic? Not at all! It looks great. Does T-3 mean anything? I'm making my own CPU of sorts too. It's based on the MC14500 1-bit control unit. So far the core of it can be crammed into nine 7400 series IC's. Cheers, Alexis. From lynchaj at yahoo.com Fri Mar 19 17:35:00 2010 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:35:00 -0400 Subject: home brew S-100 PCB manufacturing order Message-ID: <4C9604D03D8B4C439BF827691160B511@andrewdesktop> Hi! I am getting ready to make another manufactured PCB order for some S-100 PCBs. These are the S100Computers.com and/or N8VEM boards. These are the S-100 regular prototyping board, S-100 backplane, S-100 buffered prototyping board, S-100 IDE, and S-100 ASCII keyboard. If you are interested in getting in on the S-100 board order please contact me. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch From mcguire at neurotica.com Fri Mar 19 19:10:13 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 20:10:13 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> On Mar 19, 2010, at 4:54 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >>> I am talking about microcontrollers, not desktop computer CPUs... >> >> Have you looked at some of the high-end microcontrollers lately? > > Err no. At one time we had these wonderful things called 'data > books' I'd > flip through them to see what chips were available, their featurs, > etc. I > bought a lot of said books. You can do that on their websites, without killing trees. (not that I care personally, but..) The searching and browsing capabilities of some of the manufacturers' websites are getting better every year. And now, I can get datasheets for pretty much any random component in seconds, rather than having to wait for weeks to find a copy of a databook that I don't have. I have nearly three thousand PDF datasheets now, and those are just for parts that I've been interested in for one reason or another. (curiosity, repair, use in new design, found a chip somewhere and wanted to know what it is, etc) I have about 35-40 databooks, and now I have FAR more useful information available to me then when I used to use those databooks regularly. Not all change is automatically bad. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Fri Mar 19 19:24:35 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 20:24:35 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <547563.9385.qm@web111715.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <547563.9385.qm@web111715.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Mar 19, 2010, at 5:20 AM, Julian Skidmore wrote: >>> if you want specs to programming microchip ics, go here... >>> >>> http://www.microchip.com/stellent/ >>> idcplgIdcService=SS_GET_PAGE&nodeId=1407 >> I was under the impression that the FLASH specifications didn't cover >> the ICD hardware, but there you go... > >> But they're handy anyway. I've got a Maplin PIC programmer kicking >> around somewhere -- the original software only programmed the 16C84 > > Despite the horrors of programming PICs; they do have at least one > redeeming feature here - they're genuine classic architectures, being > designed in the mid-70s for General Instruments ;-) > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PIC_microcontroller#History Well by that metric, nearly all of today's microprocessors and microcontrollers are genuine classic architectures. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Mar 19 19:44:05 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:44:05 -0600 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca> Dave McGuire wrote: > And now, I can get datasheets for pretty much any random component in > seconds, rather than having to wait for weeks to find a copy of a > databook that I don't have. I have nearly three thousand PDF datasheets > now, and those are just for parts that I've been interested in for one > reason or another. (curiosity, repair, use in new design, found a chip > somewhere and wanted to know what it is, etc) I have about 35-40 > databooks, and now I have FAR more useful information available to me > then when I used to use those databooks regularly. > > Not all change is automatically bad. 3 am I want to check a datasheet ... it is 30 seconds including the time I take to turn on the light switch. I need to use windows and the internet it is about 20 minutes later I may have the information. > -Dave > Ben. From mcguire at neurotica.com Fri Mar 19 19:49:33 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 20:49:33 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com> On Mar 19, 2010, at 8:44 PM, Ben wrote: >> And now, I can get datasheets for pretty much any random component in >> seconds, rather than having to wait for weeks to find a copy of a >> databook that I don't have. I have nearly three thousand PDF >> datasheets >> now, and those are just for parts that I've been interested in for >> one >> reason or another. (curiosity, repair, use in new design, found a >> chip >> somewhere and wanted to know what it is, etc) I have about 35-40 >> databooks, and now I have FAR more useful information available to me >> then when I used to use those databooks regularly. >> >> Not all change is automatically bad. > > 3 am I want to check a datasheet ... it is 30 seconds including the > time > I take to turn on the light switch. > I need to use windows and the internet it is about 20 minutes later > I may have the information. That's because you use Windows. I get it in seconds. Every time. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Mar 19 19:55:39 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:55:39 -0600 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca> <0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 19, 2010, at 8:44 PM, Ben wrote: >>> And now, I can get datasheets for pretty much any random component in >>> seconds, rather than having to wait for weeks to find a copy of a >>> databook that I don't have. I have nearly three thousand PDF datasheets >>> now, and those are just for parts that I've been interested in for one >>> reason or another. (curiosity, repair, use in new design, found a chip >>> somewhere and wanted to know what it is, etc) I have about 35-40 >>> databooks, and now I have FAR more useful information available to me >>> then when I used to use those databooks regularly. >>> >>> Not all change is automatically bad. >> >> 3 am I want to check a datasheet ... it is 30 seconds including the time >> I take to turn on the light switch. >> I need to use windows and the internet it is about 20 minutes later >> I may have the information. > > That's because you use Windows. I get it in seconds. Every time. > > -Dave >> PS .. I have to turn on the light where the computer is and turn on the computer ... . That still takes a while to boot a real OS. From mcguire at neurotica.com Fri Mar 19 20:05:41 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 21:05:41 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca> <0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com> <4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: On Mar 19, 2010, at 8:55 PM, Ben wrote: > PS .. I have to turn on the light where the computer is > and turn on the computer ... . That still takes a while to boot > a real OS. Oh...you shut your computers down?? Wow, it still amazes me that some people do that. I leave my desktop machine on 24x7 because I never know when I might need something that's on it if I'm away from home. I frequently log into it from my cell phone via ssh when I'm out and about if I need to look for something in my notes or whatever. And (being practical) I'm sitting in front of it nearly all the time anyway, and it's much less wear and tear on the hardware than constantly powering up and down. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From trixter at oldskool.org Sat Mar 20 00:12:31 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 00:12:31 -0500 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA4593F.7000108@oldskool.org> On 3/17/2010 3:06 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> >> On 3/16/2010 3:09 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >>> What are you really trying to do? Waht is the machine you are taking the >>> outputs from, and what are you trying to do with them? >> >> Trying to capture the output of a program running on an IBM 5160 that >> only looks correct via CGA RGB output. > > Right. And what are you capturing it on? What inputs _exactly_ do you > have? For example, do you have separate syncs, composite sync, or > sync-on-green? I'm not sure I understand the question: There is no capture device made that can do it, so I have no device to capture from. I do have an Extron unit that can convert RGB TLL to analog RGBH with sync on green but it doesn't handle the *I* of RGBI, nor the recoloring of color index #6. I have a solution that works for 95% of the cases that don't involve timing tricks (like switching palettes mid-screen) that is cheating, but it seems to work: I have an old ATI VGA with a program that can put the card into a CGA-like mode where the register writes behave like CGA and not like VGA -- palette and background changes work like they should on CGA, the font is 8x8 like CGA, and the output is 400 lines (200 line-doubled) and that can be captured with any vga->video converter. It's the last 5% I'm striving for, since the stuff worth capturing is the stuff that uses tricks to extend CGA. >> Had I enough free time, I could learn it too, but I don't have much >> these days. My free time in my youth was spent learning the hardware >> from the outside (ie. assembler programming), not the inside. > > I have the opposite problem. I learnt hardware first. Which means I tend > to think about probramming as to what it will do to the hardware > (somtimes at a very low level). Ah, but then you would like assembler -- that's where our two worlds meet. -- 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 jdr_use at bluewin.ch Sat Mar 20 01:03:12 2010 From: jdr_use at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 07:03:12 +0100 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA46520.40402@bluewin.ch> Tony Duell wrote: > Err no. At one time we had these wonderful things called 'data books' I'd > flip through them to see what chips were available, their featurs, etc. I > bought a lot of said books. > > I know the feeling, but nowadays a datasheet for a single chip can go to 1200 pages. ( one-chip baseband for mobiles ) The internal version of that datasheet goes to 2000 pages. And that is without the software description.... You really do not want to handle this in paper format. Jos From icipasla at gmail.com Fri Mar 19 16:41:14 2010 From: icipasla at gmail.com (Normand) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:41:14 -0500 Subject: Old DEC Power Control 861C In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: I've finally received a new capacitor (it took quite some time) and replace the old one. All is OK now. It ended up being a simple repair but without help from this group to identify the problem I'm not certain that I would have succeeded. Again, thanks to all that helped. Normand On Thu, Dec 31, 2009 at 11:49 AM, Normand Fisher wrote: > *Many thanks, > > I found a leaking capacitor just as you have described. I've ordered new ones and will soon be able to replace it. > > I'll let you know if that fixes the problem (It should!).** > > Normand > *>* Old DEC Power Control 861C Hi, > *>* > *>* looks like I am not getting the posting in my e-mail but my messages do get > *>* posted. > * > This issue came up a few months back. Apparently gmail filters the > > replies to your own messages somewhere (and not to somewhere sensible!). > Perhaps somebody else can rememebr the details. > > >* > *>* I found this replyto my previous message by Tony Duell > *>* in > *>* the archives. > *>* > *>* To follow-up, the 861C emits a crackling noise for the first few seconds (20 > *>* or so) and then I can hear a relay chattering (very noisy!). > *>* > *>* Also the light on the front panel is flashing continuously (maybe that's > *>* normal.) > * > old DEC neons tend to flicker randomly (and it's truely random). > > The basic design is for the mains : > > Mains in--->filter --->Breaker-+--->Unswitched outs > | > +--->Contactor (big relay)-> Switched outs > > The contactor is controlled (in the 861) by a reed relay on the little > > PCB inside. This has a differentially-wound coil to give the 'ground for > on' and 'ground for off' functionality on the 3 pin connector. The reed > relay coil is powered by a little transformer/rectifier/capacitor > > circuit, mostly on the PCB. > > My first suspicioun is that capacitor. Open it up and look for any > electrolytics on the PCB inside. > > -tony > > From 1metalguru at gmail.com Fri Mar 19 21:22:12 2010 From: 1metalguru at gmail.com (Darrell Norquay) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 20:22:12 -0600 Subject: PDP8/A for sale Message-ID: <77d877581003191922g47eda060ma4810642f1909ff3@mail.gmail.com> To those interested in my PDP8/A system: It contains: 1 - M8315 Hex Omnibus CPU 1 - H219B 16K Core Memory Module 1 - M8316 Option Board 1 with 1 - KC8AA Programming Panel 1 - M8317 Option Board 2 bootstrap 1 - M8342 Parallel Control 1 - M8357 RX8E Omnibus Interface 1 - M8326 Inter-processor Buffer 1 - PDP8/A Field Maintenance Print Set. 1 - PDP8 Internal Bus Options Maintenance Manual Vol 2 I am accepting offers to purchase this unit. I live in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. I have checked with UPS and Xpress Post and shipping to the continental United States would start at approximately $100, assuming a package 24x24x12 weighing 60 lbs. I also have a PDP8/I WO25 Core Memory Module mod 30-05256-2 made by Data-Ram Corp.: Darrell From csquared3 at tx.rr.com Fri Mar 19 22:19:58 2010 From: csquared3 at tx.rr.com (CSquared) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 22:19:58 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4B9EEBAE.2060501@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4B9D3B78.5070107@tx.rr.com> from "CSquared" at Mar 14, 10 02:39:36 pm, <4B9E6C5E.12985.1C919D2@cclist.sydex.com> <4B9EEBAE.2060501@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4BA43EDE.4070906@tx.rr.com> Ben wrote: > Chuck Guzis wrote: >> On 15 Mar 2010 at 21:09, Tony Duell wrote: >> >>> I've certainly heard it called 'fish paper' over here. I am not sure >>> if you can still buy it anywhere, if you can, I am looking for a >>> source... > > I thought old newspaper went with fish, or is that just cats. > AES still sells that and few other kinds of paper. > http://www.tubesandmore.com/ Hmmm, indeed they do, thanks. "Yellow varnished cambric" as well... > >> Also sometimes called "leatheroid", a name about as mysterious as >> "fish paper". I imagine that kraft or resin paper soaked with >> beeswax or paraffin wax would do in a pinch. >> >> I remeber winding my own RF coils on a wooden bobbin and boiling them >> in beeswax. Great stuff, beeswasx. > > What other uses do you it for other than candles? > BTW you can now get beeswax & foil capacitors again, fot the audio freaks. > >> I discovered that paper as an insulator in undersea cables is useful >> as if the outer jacket springs a leak, the paper will swell with the >> moisture and prevent seawater from wicking the length of the cable. > > I wonder when the last undersea cable was layed? > >> >> --Chuck >> > Ben... > > > From csquared3 at tx.rr.com Fri Mar 19 22:41:26 2010 From: csquared3 at tx.rr.com (CSquared) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 22:41:26 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: , <4BA38542.70803@tx.rr.com> Message-ID: <4BA443E6.6000805@tx.rr.com> Randy Dawson wrote: > > >> Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 09:08:02 -0500 >> From: csquared3 at tx.rr.com >> To: >> Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update >> CC: cctalk at classiccmp.org >> >> Tony Duell wrote: >>>> I've done a bit of that too over the years, just a few motors but more >>>> transformers. One thing that has always troubled me is the usual poor >>> I;ve done trasnformers too, but fortunately I've never had to do one that >>> had to stand main voltage or similar. >> I've done the high voltage winding a time or two, which I think usually >> is immediately atop the mains primary winding. >>>> condition of what I believe is at least sometimes called the "fish >>>> paper" used to provide extra insulation between the coating on the wires >>> I've certainly heard it called 'fish paper' over here. I am not sure if >>> you can still buy it anywhere, if you can, I am looking for a source... >> If I find one I'll try to remember to let you know. I must admit I've >> never looked very hard, partly because it always seems to be somewhat >> formed to a shape that I don't know I could duplicate. I wonder if it >> is essentially flat when installed and then sort of sets into the >> ultimate shape. >>>> and the stator/armature/core metal. Back in my younger more foolish >>>> days I'm afraid I was sometimes guilty of using ordinary card stock as a >>>> solution, though I've wondered if that is not a bit of a fire hazard in >>> Well, it probably is eeasier to ignite than fishpaper, but normal paper >>> is not that easy to set on firs. A soldering iron won't do it, for >>> example. If a transformer is getting hot enough to ignite paper, you have >>> problems. >> Yes, I agree - that was what I meant by the reference to Ray Bradbury's >> SF book. I believe the 451 degrees F to be fairly accurate. I think >> the paint on the outside would be bubbling at that temperature! >>> My greater worry would be that the paper may absorb moisture and >>> electrically break down.At one time paper soaked in wax was used, but >>> this would seem to be an even greater fire risk. >> Hmmm, yes, I would think so too. >>> >>>> spite of "Fahrenheit 451". I'd just be interested in hearing your >>>> thoughts on this issue. >>> I'd probably not do it in something that was going to be used by somebody >>> else, or somethign that was going to run unattended. I might do it for >>> something I was goping to use myself. >> I believe all of this I've ever done with mains voltages involved has >> been for my own, very intermittent use. Now that I think about it, I >> did do some audio transformers in a car radio many years ago. It's been >> so long I don't recall what issues I may have had with those. >>> -tony >>> > > Antique Electronic Supply has your fish paper S-M5609, $5.25 for a 9" roll (250 sq in) > > www.tubesandmore.com > > Randy Thanks, that might well come in handy some day. Later, Charlie C. From tingox at gmail.com Sat Mar 20 03:43:23 2010 From: tingox at gmail.com (Torfinn Ingolfsen) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 09:43:23 +0100 Subject: Just another homebuilt TTL machine In-Reply-To: <4BA3CC2A.2030908@bluewin.ch> References: <4BA3CC2A.2030908@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: On Fri, Mar 19, 2010 at 8:10 PM, Jos Dreesen wrote: > > I have put online some pictures and schematics of a rather pathetic > homebuilt TTL machine I constructed around 1985 > > Specs 12 bit wide, 8K ram, 256 word hardware stack. > CPU 3 x 74181 > Hardcoded instruction set. > > No blinkenlights, but, almost as good, 4 nixies as display. > I really like the nixie display. A cool machine. -- Regards, Torfinn Ingolfsen From tshoppa at wmata.com Sat Mar 20 07:26:19 2010 From: tshoppa at wmata.com (Shoppa, Tim) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 08:26:19 -0400 Subject: Finding datasheets on the net (was Disc analyser news update) Message-ID: Dave wrote: >On Mar 19, 2010, at 8:44 PM, Ben wrote: >>> And now, I can get datasheets for pretty much any random component in >>> seconds, rather than having to wait for weeks to find a copy of a >>> databook that I don't have. I have nearly three thousand PDF >>> datasheets >>> now, and those are just for parts that I've been interested in for >>> one >>> reason or another. (curiosity, repair, use in new design, found a >>> chip >>> somewhere and wanted to know what it is, etc) I have about 35-40 >>> databooks, and now I have FAR more useful information available to me >>> then when I used to use those databooks regularly. >>> >>> Not all change is automatically bad. >> >> 3 am I want to check a datasheet ... it is 30 seconds including the >> time >> I take to turn on the light switch. >> I need to use windows and the internet it is about 20 minutes later >> I may have the information. > That's because you use Windows. I get it in seconds. Every time. A couple random thoughts: Google goes through phases where searching for a random TTL or CMOS or old microprocessor or transistor part number returns 95%+ sponsored spam links to places that don't have the part but want to sell you the part anyway. At other points Google is working "nicely" and the top couple hits are to the actual datasheet. If the part is a "basic part" that is still available in some commercial form or another I find that going to Mouser or Digikey is often more effective today than going through Google. And I say that being a big Google user. Mouser and Digikey tend to keep parts in their search engines with links to datasheets for maybe a decade or two after they leave special order. And it's useful to know that yes, the CA3146 is being discontinued. Or that the CD4007 is actually the same as the CA3600 :-). Lots of Windows installations have a zillion spyware things running that interfere greatly with downloading the PDF after you find it. Sometimes these things make you believe that they're actually toolbars, but they aren't. Usually the download accelerators fall in this category too... launching 50 simultaneous download sessions to fetch a 3 page datasheet is usually a big loss. I know that I'm being OS-ist when I talk about Windows like that, but really it's the unknowing users getting sucked into thinking "another toolbar? Hey, I want that!" and "another download accelerator? Hey, I want that!" that are at fault. When you see a web browser and literally 75% of the screen is taken up by toolbars and download accelerators that really are actually all spyware, something is seriously out of whack, but I'd estimate that probably 90% of Windows PC's that are not vigilantly patrolled end up that way. Tim. From shoppa at trailing-edge.com Sat Mar 20 08:01:22 2010 From: shoppa at trailing-edge.com (Tim Shoppa) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 09:01:22 -0400 Subject: Datasheets and modern display technology Message-ID: <20100320130122.5D569BA5538@mini-me.trailing-edge.com> I appreciate the old databooks very much... but with bound books keeping them open on the bench to the page you want was always a problem. Anything without a good binding fell apart 30 years ago. Even the ones that are well bound (e.g. the hardback TTL books from TI) don't last forever although they were printed by the millions and are still readily found. What I actually like, is having a big 23" or bigger screen at the bench with web access to the datasheets. That's pretty decent. I can zoom the pinout big enough that I can read it from the other side of the bench, or I can open the pinout and the state table simultaneously in two windows. Pretty good, at least as long as I have my glasses on. But the screen still isn't as good as having the datasheet right there on the bench (flat on the bench) a foot or less away from the circuit. I wonder how a Kindle will do on the bench? Anyone drop their soldering iron on a screen yet? The good pages in the databooks always had solder or food or both on them, that made the good pages easier to find! And don't bother lecturing me about not having food and solder in the same place. We all grew up with solder when we were kids, and everyone knows that WE'RE PERFECTLY NORMAL now that we're adults! Tim. From brad at heeltoe.com Sat Mar 20 08:54:49 2010 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 09:54:49 -0400 Subject: Datasheets and modern display technology (now kindle) In-Reply-To: <20100320130122.5D569BA5538@mini-me.trailing-edge.com> (sfid-20100320_090250_807078_05828843) References: <20100320130122.5D569BA5538@mini-me.trailing-edge.com> (sfid-20100320_090250_807078_05828843) Message-ID: <4BA4D3A9.5000107@heeltoe.com> Tim Shoppa wrote: > And don't bother lecturing me about not having food and solder in the > same place. We all grew up with solder when we were kids, and everyone > knows that WE'RE PERFECTLY NORMAL now that we're adults! > gurgle (I am a little worried about all the rosin/lead smoke I have inhaled, but I still eat & drink coffee at my bench...) I tried to put a few pdf's on the small kindle I have (for exactly the purpose you mentioned) but I didn't have much luck formatting them to look good. specifically I wanted the pdp 11 handbook, but it came out sideways and I could not figure out how to fix it. If anyone comes up with well formatted pdp 11 & pdp 8 handbooks for the small kindle I'll sure contribute to your beer fund. has anyone else tried or have a good formula? -brad From trebor77 at execpc.com Sat Mar 20 10:20:09 2010 From: trebor77 at execpc.com (Robert J. Stevens) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 09:20:09 -0600 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA4E7A9.7040106@execpc.com> 1. Re: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic > Message: 1 > Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 13:05:18 -0400 > From: Dave McGuire > Subject: Re: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > Message-ID: <2C8AA3F6-864D-4777-A584-466024E6A276 at neurotica.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; delsp=yes; format=flowed > On Mar 19, 2010, at 1:12 PM, Robert J. Stevens wrote: > >> I have a set of the Steve Ciarcia Circuit Cellar Magazines if >> Anyone is Interested >> Volume I originally cost $8.00 >> Volume II originally cost $12.95 >> Volume III originally cost $16.95 >> Volume IV originally cost $18.95 >> WOW >> Wow indeed. >> Are these in fact "Circuit Cellar Ink" magazines, or are they the >> compendium of Ciarcia's Circuit Cellar columns from BYTE magazine? I was not aware that there were Different Publications of his Work. These are indeed compendiums from BYTE. I guess I should have called them Books. But the are in Pristine Condition Looks like they have never been opened MUCH Bob From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sat Mar 20 09:39:21 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 08:39:21 -0600 Subject: Finding datasheets on the net (was Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA4DE19.4000305@jetnet.ab.ca> Shoppa, Tim wrote: That's because you use Windows. I get it in seconds. Every time. > > A couple random thoughts: > > Google goes through phases where searching for a random TTL or CMOS > or old microprocessor or transistor part number returns 95%+ sponsored > spam links to places that don't have the part but want to sell you the part anyway. > > At other points Google is working "nicely" and the top couple hits are to the > actual datasheet. And if you are lucky the fifth or sixth hit is a *free* pdf. From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Mar 20 09:55:33 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 10:55:33 -0400 Subject: Finding datasheets on the net (was Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BA4DE19.4000305@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4BA4DE19.4000305@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: On Mar 20, 2010, at 10:39 AM, Ben wrote: >> A couple random thoughts: >> >> Google goes through phases where searching for a random TTL or CMOS >> or old microprocessor or transistor part number returns 95%+ >> sponsored >> spam links to places that don't have the part but want to sell you >> the part anyway. >> >> At other points Google is working "nicely" and the top couple hits >> are to the >> actual datasheet. > > And if you are lucky the fifth or sixth hit is a *free* pdf. I've never seen one that required payment, but I've seen plenty of places that SUPPOSEDLY have the PDF you're looking for, but actually don't. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Mar 20 10:03:47 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 11:03:47 -0400 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: <4BA4E7A9.7040106@execpc.com> References: <4BA4E7A9.7040106@execpc.com> Message-ID: <9D174FF0-192D-4778-8F07-6C55D1AC6124@neurotica.com> On Mar 20, 2010, at 11:20 AM, Robert J. Stevens wrote: >> Message: 1 >> Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 13:05:18 -0400 >> From: Dave McGuire >> Subject: Re: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic >> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" >> >> Message-ID: <2C8AA3F6-864D-4777-A584-466024E6A276 at neurotica.com> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; delsp=yes; format=flowed >> On Mar 19, 2010, at 1:12 PM, Robert J. Stevens wrote: >> >>> I have a set of the Steve Ciarcia Circuit Cellar Magazines if >>> Anyone is Interested >>> Volume I originally cost $8.00 >>> Volume II originally cost $12.95 >>> Volume III originally cost $16.95 >>> Volume IV originally cost $18.95 >>> WOW >> Wow indeed. >> Are these in fact "Circuit Cellar Ink" magazines, or are they >> the compendium of Ciarcia's Circuit Cellar columns from BYTE >> magazine? > > I was not aware that there were Different Publications of his Work. When BYTE changed from a technical magazine to a PC sales magazine, he left and started his own magazine called Circuit Cellar Ink. It is a current publication. It's primarily an embedded systems magazine now. It's a great magazine. > These are indeed compendiums from BYTE. I guess I should have > called them Books. ...which they are. ;) > But the are in Pristine Condition Looks like they have never been > opened MUCH Excellent. They're wonderful books. I've had the first two since I was a kid, and obtained all the rest of them (up to VII), including the "best of" book which has other articles that aren't in those books, over the next bunch of years. I think I got the last ones about two years ago. -Daven -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From shoppa at trailing-edge.com Sat Mar 20 10:08:20 2010 From: shoppa at trailing-edge.com (Tim Shoppa) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 11:08:20 -0400 Subject: Finding datasheets on the net (was Disc analyser news update) Message-ID: <20100320150820.1A3B2BA4D45@mini-me.trailing-edge.com> Dave wrote: >Ben wrote: >> And if you are lucky the fifth or sixth hit is a *free* pdf. > I've never seen one that required payment, but I've seen plenty of > places that SUPPOSEDLY have the PDF you're looking for, but actually > don't. Most commonly, I find places that try to sell me parts that haven't been made for 30 or 40 years, but the page is simply a numeric list of every part in some huge number range. How can it be a viable business model to buy google advertising to sell parts that you do not actually have? My guess: counterfeits, esp relabeled counterfeits. Or maybe the advertising cost is so completely negligible that they can afford to put up ads for things they don't have? I remember "too cheap to meter" but that's ridiculous. Tim. From keithvz at verizon.net Sat Mar 20 11:10:11 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 12:10:11 -0400 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> <4B99458B.6000409@philpem.me.uk> (sfid-20100311_145056_600573_5F1B2CDD) Message-ID: <4BA4F363.8050201@verizon.net> Sorry for the late reply. Brad Parker wrote: > On Mar 11, 2010, at 2:33 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote: > >>> And this is my current frustration! Verilog. FPGAs. Etc. >> Verilog isn't that hard to learn, it's all the other stuff that goes along with it (metastability, clock synchronisation, clock domains, finite-state machine implementation, ...) > > It's a good point. If you want to make reliable designs you need to learn and understand all those things very well. > > If you want to do real synchronous design, which most of these fpga or even cpld designs should be, > you need to learn some fundamentals. As painful as it might be, I'd try and find one of the entry level > EE logic design courses, either on the web or via a book. Yeah, I think the one problem is that I'm trying to learn logic design AND verilog at the same time. I've got some basic skills but they are definitely falling short. When you talk about courses via the web, are you referring to stuff like MIT's OCW, or ? An EE friend of mine used "Contemporary Logic Design", and it looks like the book is available used for cheap. I flipped through it, it seems decent enough. Any other recommendations? > But you really need to learn proper state machine design if you want your designs > to work in real hardware... The language templates within xilinx's ISE provide a number of example state machines. I've used their basic outlines, and then watched the synthesis process to ensure that the state machines were being extracted and recognized in my projects. > check out "Verilog Digital Computer Design: Algorithms Into Hardware". It has a lot of examples you could > type in and get to work quickly. Is this by Mark Gordon Arnold from 1998? I always wonder about older books. If they are the defacto reference standard, it's one thing. I sometimes think that if they are generic enough to still apply, it's not specific enough to my boards/environment/current language standards to help. If I'm working on classic computer stuff, then much of material is old, so then the associated books are old too. > In the end, verilog is just the tool. You'll need to understand good digital design viscerally but once you do you > can use any HDL - they're all the same in the end. Thanks Keith From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Mar 20 11:48:55 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 12:48:55 -0400 Subject: Datasheets and modern display technology In-Reply-To: <20100320130122.5D569BA5538@mini-me.trailing-edge.com> References: <20100320130122.5D569BA5538@mini-me.trailing-edge.com> Message-ID: <0DACDDB0-A0D6-4107-AF63-0D079EFA9415@neurotica.com> On Mar 20, 2010, at 9:01 AM, Tim Shoppa wrote: > I appreciate the old databooks very much... but with bound books > keeping them open on the bench to the page you want was always a > problem. > Anything without a good binding fell apart 30 years ago. Even the ones > that are well bound (e.g. the hardback TTL books from TI) don't last > forever although they were printed by the millions and are still > readily > found. > > What I actually like, is having a big 23" or bigger screen at the > bench > with web access to the datasheets. That's pretty decent. I can zoom > the > pinout big enough that I can read it from the other side of the bench, > or I can open the pinout and the state table simultaneously in two > windows. Pretty good, at least as long as I have my glasses on. > > But the screen still isn't as good as having the datasheet right there > on the bench (flat on the bench) a foot or less away from the circuit. > > I wonder how a Kindle will do on the bench? Anyone drop their > soldering iron > on a screen yet? The good pages in the databooks always had solder > or food or both on them, that made the good pages easier to find! I've thought about that sort of thing for the bench. But just having a terminal there (actually just nearby) solves most of the problem. For something that I want ON the bench, I print the relevant pages of the PDF. Paper is cheap, toner is cheap. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Sat Mar 20 11:57:02 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 09:57:02 -0700 Subject: Datasheets and modern display technology In-Reply-To: <0DACDDB0-A0D6-4107-AF63-0D079EFA9415@neurotica.com> References: <20100320130122.5D569BA5538@mini-me.trailing-edge.com>, <0DACDDB0-A0D6-4107-AF63-0D079EFA9415@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4BA49BEE.9253.52D8CD@cclist.sydex.com> On 20 Mar 2010 at 12:48, Dave McGuire wrote: > I've thought about that sort of thing for the bench. But just > having a terminal there (actually just nearby) solves most of the > problem. For something that I want ON the bench, I print the > relevant pages of the PDF. Paper is cheap, toner is cheap. Yup, and it's easy to scribble on paper. Not so much on a Kindle. So much of a datasheet is filler that you don't need at the bench-- mostly, the pinout will do. Sometimes, I'll cut and paste to make a couple of sheets of paper with the pinout of every IC used in the design for quick reference. --Chuck From js at cimmeri.com Sat Mar 20 12:12:55 2010 From: js at cimmeri.com (js at cimmeri.com) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 12:12:55 -0500 Subject: HP 7937H CS/80 drive free for parts In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA50217.2040508@cimmeri.com> Folks, I've a 7937H that turns on and passes diag fine, but as soon as I try to access it, I get a servo error. I suspect the HDA assembly but have no spares to swap to confirm. The entire drive is free for pickup from Rockville, MD. If you want small parts shipped, there will be a charge for shipping and handling... Email me if interested. This notice will be in effect for 1 week from date of posting. After that, please disregard.. Thank you, John Singleton jsk at cimmerik.com (remove all the k's) From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Sat Mar 20 12:48:20 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 12:48:20 -0500 Subject: Datasheets and modern display technology In-Reply-To: <4BA49BEE.9253.52D8CD@cclist.sydex.com> References: <20100320130122.5D569BA5538@mini-me.trailing-edge.com>, , <0DACDDB0-A0D6-4107-AF63-0D079EFA9415@neurotica.com>, <4BA49BEE.9253.52D8CD@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: > From: cclist at sydex.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 09:57:02 -0700 > Subject: Re: Datasheets and modern display technology > > On 20 Mar 2010 at 12:48, Dave McGuire wrote: > > > I've thought about that sort of thing for the bench. But just > > having a terminal there (actually just nearby) solves most of the > > problem. For something that I want ON the bench, I print the > > relevant pages of the PDF. Paper is cheap, toner is cheap. > > Yup, and it's easy to scribble on paper. Not so much on a Kindle. > So much of a datasheet is filler that you don't need at the bench-- > mostly, the pinout will do. > > Sometimes, I'll cut and paste to make a couple of sheets of paper > with the pinout of every IC used in the design for quick reference. > > --Chuck > Hi Chuck! I thought I was the only one doing paper dolls! I'll take tat a step further and put every IC footprint on paper, and move em around a bit for PCB layout planning. Randy _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail is redefining busy with tools for the New Busy. Get more from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_2 From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Sat Mar 20 11:10:45 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 16:10:45 -0000 Subject: great abandonware for your classic PC References: , , <20100316191521.P70534@shell.lmi.net>, , <020701cac7a0$b1079780$7c2a5f0a@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <017201cac857$f77ec230$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> I'd be happy with that, and considering that was back in 1994 you must have been pretty rich (for a while). I get ?19K a *year* (before tax) at my current job (which has nothing to do with programming). Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk ----- Original Message ----- From: "Randy Dawson" To: "classic computers" Sent: Friday, March 19, 2010 9:35 PM Subject: RE: great abandonware for your classic PC Andrew, I got 60K first month, 30K next month, then 20, 10 5 and zero. I was part of the screen saver fad, and it was all over in 6 months. Randy > From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:28:10 +0000 > > > and how much of that $240,000 did you see? (I hope I'm not overstepping any > bounderies) > > > Regards, > Andrew B > aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Randy Dawson" > To: "classic computers" > Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 2:34 AM > Subject: RE: great abandonware for your classic PC > > > > Er, Fred, > > I write software too, I wrote the first ever multimedia program for the PC > in DOS and Windows, the roller coster simulator COASTER. (realtime fractal > video decompression, with audio) > > First months sales $240,000, in 1994 > > Outsold Lotus 123. > > So don't put me in the 'those of you', > > I'm in the those of us. > > Randy > > > Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 19:20:32 -0700 > > From: cisin at xenosoft.com > > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > > Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC > > > > On Tue, 16 Mar 2010, Randy Dawson wrote: > > > You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not. > > > All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3 > > > Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab > > > Graphics like Dr. Halo > > > Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal > > > http://vetusware.com > > > > There is NO abandonware anywhere on that site. EVERYTHING there is > > illegal copies for piracy. > > > > Those of us who make a living writing software do not condone unauthorized > > distribution of copyrighted works. > > _________________________________________________________________ > Hotmail has tools for the New Busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. > http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_1= > _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Trusted email with powerful SPAM protection. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/210850553/direct/01/= From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Sat Mar 20 11:46:22 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 16:46:22 -0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Dave McGuire" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Saturday, March 20, 2010 1:05 AM Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > > Oh...you shut your computers down?? Wow, it still amazes me that > some people do that. > > I leave my desktop machine on 24x7 because I never know when I > might need something that's on it if I'm away from home. I > frequently log into it from my cell phone via ssh when I'm out and > about if I need to look for something in my notes or whatever. > > And (being practical) I'm sitting in front of it nearly all the > time anyway, and it's much less wear and tear on the hardware than > constantly powering up and down. > Leaving a computer running 24/7 may not harm the hardware as much, but it harms the evironment and your electricity bill. We always shut our computers down at work at the end of the day, or when they are finished with. I never leave my laptop on all the time, since I only use it a few hours each day. I certainly disconnect from the internet when I don't need website, Gopher or BBS access. Less chance of a virus infecting my laptop then. My laptop currently takes 10 minutes to boot (including everything loading after logging in). I do need to do a registry cleanout though[1], which is lucky that I have a week off in April. Plenty of time to get all the 'little' jobs done :) Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk [1] A couple of programs I installed a few months back decided that they needed to be active straight away, and didn't give me any choice in the matter :( From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Sat Mar 20 12:24:29 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 17:24:29 -0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update References: <4BA46520.40402@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <017601cac858$204e4c80$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Jos Dreesen" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Saturday, March 20, 2010 6:03 AM Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > Tony Duell wrote: > > Err no. At one time we had these wonderful things called 'data books' I'd > > flip through them to see what chips were available, their featurs, etc. I > > bought a lot of said books. > > > > > I know the feeling, but nowadays a datasheet for a single chip can go to > 1200 pages. ( one-chip baseband for mobiles ) > The internal version of that datasheet goes to 2000 pages. > And that is without the software description.... > > You really do not want to handle this in paper format. > > Jos Just curious, is that a single-core chip or multiple core? Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Mar 20 13:14:29 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 14:14:29 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <29C72050-2941-4ADA-A553-71B1F21CCEED@neurotica.com> On Mar 20, 2010, at 12:46 PM, Andrew Burton wrote: >> Oh...you shut your computers down?? Wow, it still amazes me that >> some people do that. >> >> I leave my desktop machine on 24x7 because I never know when I >> might need something that's on it if I'm away from home. I >> frequently log into it from my cell phone via ssh when I'm out and >> about if I need to look for something in my notes or whatever. >> >> And (being practical) I'm sitting in front of it nearly all the >> time anyway, and it's much less wear and tear on the hardware than >> constantly powering up and down. > > Leaving a computer running 24/7 may not harm the hardware as much, > but it > harms the evironment and your electricity bill. That's not relevant here; I run servers that are used by people in other places. My power bill is consistently about $400-500/mo, and that's a great deal of consolidation and optimization. Some may whine, but that's still a lot cheaper than two racks' worth of colo space, and I can work on things without getting dressed and leaving the house. So in the face of that, leaving my desktop machine on doesn't make any real difference. Further, leaving it on (as I mentioned earlier) means I can get to it from other places, which I frequently need to do. > We always shut our computers > down at work at the end of the day, or when they are finished with. > I never > leave my laptop on all the time, since I only use it a few hours > each day. I > certainly disconnect from the internet when I don't need website, > Gopher or > BBS access. Less chance of a virus infecting my laptop then. I run UNIX; that addresses the virus problem. ;) -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 20 13:06:58 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 18:06:58 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM In-Reply-To: <961F34038CE248AB930C0CDD2FB21F2C@xp1800> from "Rik Bos" at Mar 19, 10 10:29:50 pm Message-ID: > > > The 2671 has an empty socket on the HP-IB interface board, the one > > > closest to the printer PCB is empty. This sounds as though it might be a different cersion of the HPIB board, but I'll give the numbers in a second. > Seems a good idea, I'll write down the part numbers so we can compare. OK, I've dug my 2671G out and taken it apart. I find the instructions on the bottom very amusing. They tell you 'no user serviceable parts inside' and then tell you just how to take the cover odd. Go figure... Anyway The PSU is a 02670-60070. I would be suprised if there are any changes there. The HPIB interface is 02670-60072. U14 (2016 RAM) and U15 (ROM) are not fitted. U2 (an 8049 microcontroller) is 1820-2833. The DIP switches are set : 1 Open (Mode) 2 Open )2K) -- this has no effect if U15 is not fitted! 3 Closed (Int ROM ) -- this means the 8049 will run from its internal ROM 4 Open (Test) The printer PCB (on the back of the thermaal print mechansim) seems to be iether a 02760-60067 or 02670-80084. U3091 (8049) is 1820-3096 U101 (ROM) is 1818-1819 There is a 10 way dIP switch set as follows : 1 Open 2 Open 3 Closed 4 Open 5 CLosed 6 Closed 7 Open 8 Closed 9 Open 10 Closed If I am reading the scheamtics properly : SW8 -> 8049 will run a program from it's internal ROM SW10 -> power-fail or watchdog tinme-out will casue a rest Others -> 8K esternal ROM (A12 is used), but note thatsince SW2 is open, PSEN/ does not enable the ROM. This means that the ROM is for data storage (font?) only, not for program code. Unfortunately I don't ahve an 8049 programmer at the moment. It's something I must get roudn to buidling. Which means I can't dump the microcotnrollers... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 20 13:43:22 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 18:43:22 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA46520.40402@bluewin.ch> from "Jos Dreesen" at Mar 20, 10 07:03:12 am Message-ID: > I know the feeling, but nowadays a datasheet for a single chip can go to > 1200 pages. ( one-chip baseband for mobiles ) But most chip data sheets, fortunately, are a lot thinner. I am not sure I could repmemenr 1200 pages of data, so I'd want it printed out so I could refer to it when I was designing (assuming I needed to use said chip, which I don't...). I would also argue that this data sheet coupld almost certainly be split up into various sections (registers, programming model, timing diagrams, pinouts, etc) and some of those could be sub-divided (A chip this complex almost certainly consists of many logical sub-systems). And that it might be sensible to have a separate data sheet for each section. Many of the 'clasisc' chips that I use have several data sheets separately covering things like the electical specs (pinouts, timing, maximum ratings), programming model (regusters, instruction set), ROM programming info (how to actually get the data into the chip) and so on. It makes a lot of sense to do it that way. > The internal version of that datasheet goes to 2000 pages. > And that is without the software description.... > > You really do not want to handle this in paper format. Well, actually, I don't want to handle it at all, but if I did, I would certianly awnt it as a book, and not somethign to attempt to read on a monitor. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 20 13:23:55 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 18:23:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> from "Dave McGuire" at Mar 19, 10 08:10:13 pm Message-ID: > > On Mar 19, 2010, at 4:54 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > >>> I am talking about microcontrollers, not desktop computer CPUs... > >> > >> Have you looked at some of the high-end microcontrollers lately? > > > > Err no. At one time we had these wonderful things called 'data > > books' I'd > > flip through them to see what chips were available, their featurs, > > etc. I > > bought a lot of said books. > > You can do that on their websites, without killing trees. (not No I can't (and this has nothing to do with the machine I run here). Even when I use a modern PC running something standard I find I can't 'flip through' a website like I can flip through a data book. In fact I find trying to read any sort of techncial documentation from a screen to be very annoying.. Even with a modern machine and a fast internet connection it simply takes too ling to 'flip through' a collection of data sheets. > that I care personally, but..) The searching and browsing Well, I have long been of the opinion that 'green means naive, and that's not changed recently':-), but since you raised it, I wonder... Since I am likely to use a databook for many years (I routinely use a data book that's over 30 years old), I wonder if the environmental damage caused by said book is more than the damage caused by using a computer to download, store, and view the data sheet every time I need it. > capabilities of some of the manufacturers' websites are getting > better every year. Seeaching is fine if you know what to search for and what terms are used. It does not replace reading data sheets and thinking 'Hey, that's a nice feature'. > > And now, I can get datasheets for pretty much any random component > in seconds, rather than having to wait for weeks to find a copy of a > databook that I don't have. I have nearly three thousand PDF There are 2 issues here. Firstly, there are components that I have used for which I can't find the data sheets in any archive on the web. An example would be the SAA5070 (and yes it is used in classic computers). OK, _current_ device data sheets are probably available, but I wonder if anyone is archiving those. The second issue is that yes, I will agree that being able to download data wheets is a Good Thing. But that doesn't mean this has to _replace_ data books. It is a very common falacy that because is better than for some application, it has to be better for all applications [1]. And as for 'wait a few weeks', when I was buing databooks about 10 or 20 years ago, they generally came next day. Quite a few companies also kept archives of their old data sheets and would send a hptocopy next day (free or for a nominal charge). [1] A trivial example is digital photography. You will get no argument from me if you claim that digital photography is useful for press work wne you need to take a picture and print it quickly, and maybe send it across the world. But this doesn't mean it's superior for all types of photography -- in fact I would claim it most certainly isn't. > datasheets now, and those are just for parts that I've been > interested in for one reason or another. (curiosity, repair, use in > new design, found a chip somewhere and wanted to know what it is, > etc) I have about 35-40 databooks, and now I have FAR more useful > information available to me then when I used to use those databooks > regularly. > > Not all change is automatically bad. True, but I think this one is. And I am actually still trying to think of a change in the last 20 years that's been for the better... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 20 13:52:54 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 18:52:54 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Finding datasheets on the net (was Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: from "Shoppa, Tim" at Mar 20, 10 08:26:19 am Message-ID: > A couple random thoughts: > > Google goes through phases where searching for a random TTL or CMOS > or old microprocessor or transistor part number returns 95%+ sponsored > spam links to places that don't have the part but want to sell you the part= > anyway. I have never found any useful information on ICs using Google. As you say, you get plenty of sites that claim they can sell you the IC.. COnsideirng that sometimes the number I have entered is a custom part (or an HP house-number or...) I wonder how genuine these ICs are. Or are they any device with the right package renumbered. After all, it it deosn't work in my circuit, that's my fault... I find http://www.datahseetarchive.com/ and http://www.digchip.com/ have many, but by no means lal, of the data sheets I need. For current devices the manufacturer's site generally has a data sheet to download, but a lot of the devices I need data on have been out of prodcution for many years. but the web sites rarely have access to obsolete device data sheets. (I can still rememebnr Motorola sending me photocopies of ancient linear IC data sheets stampped 'This is for inforamtion only, device no longer avaialble' or something like that. Great, it told me what the defective part was and I could design a replacement,) Anyway, fidning data on an IC when you know the neumber is a totally differnt ptoblem to finding out what ICs are avaialble, and what their interesting features are. That I used to do by reading data books. And as I've said repeatedly, I can't do that on the web. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 20 13:29:34 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 18:29:34 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca> from "Ben" at Mar 19, 10 06:44:05 pm Message-ID: > > Not all change is automatically bad. > > 3 am I want to check a datasheet ... it is 30 seconds including the time Less than that for me. I keep a spare copy of the TTL databook by my bed :-) > I take to turn on the light switch. > I need to use windows and the internet it is about 20 minutes later > I may have the information. Or in my case it's 'Wait until morning, hop on an omnibus, go to an internet cafe, hopefully find the data sheet I need'. When I am designing I typically want many data sheets open at the same time. Unless I covered every wall in my workshop with LCD monitors (and have expensive accidents when something flies apart or a capacitor explodes on whatever I am working on), I would have to print out every data sheet I need. Which totally negates both the environmental and cost 'beneifts' of having them on-line. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 20 14:05:10 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 19:05:10 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Datasheets and modern display technology In-Reply-To: <20100320130122.5D569BA5538@mini-me.trailing-edge.com> from "Tim Shoppa" at Mar 20, 10 09:01:22 am Message-ID: > > I appreciate the old databooks very much... but with bound books > keeping them open on the bench to the page you want was always a problem. Oh, you just use a power transoformer, the soldering irwon stand, or something like that to keep the book open :-) > Anything without a good binding fell apart 30 years ago. Even the ones Oh yes, but that's part of the fun. Most of my commonly-used data books ahve loos pages or wors now. Most are misisng the front cover. Oddly, the Philips data books (for all I use them a lot) have stood up well. > that are well bound (e.g. the hardback TTL books from TI) don't last > forever although they were printed by the millions and are still readily > found. > > What I actually like, is having a big 23" or bigger screen at the bench > with web access to the datasheets. That's pretty decent. I can zoom the > pinout big enough that I can read it from the other side of the bench, > or I can open the pinout and the state table simultaneously in two > windows. Pretty good, at least as long as I have my glasses on. Problem is that suych a monitor would last about 10 seconds in my workshop... > > But the screen still isn't as good as having the datasheet right there > on the bench (flat on the bench) a foot or less away from the circuit. > > I wonder how a Kindle will do on the bench? Anyone drop their soldering iron > on a screen yet? The good pages in the databooks always had solder No, and I am not going to try it just to see...I also wonder what would happen if an exploding electrolytic capacitor met an LCD monitor ;-) > or food or both on them, that made the good pages easier to find! Indeed.. > > And don't bother lecturing me about not having food and solder in the > same place. We all grew up with solder when we were kids, and everyone Proper lead/tin sodler too... > knows that WE'RE PERFECTLY NORMAL now that we're adults! Fortunately I have no desire to be 'normal'. And Monty Pytho said 'Sanity can be cured. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 20 13:38:43 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 18:38:43 +0000 (GMT) Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <4BA4593F.7000108@oldskool.org> from "Jim Leonard" at Mar 20, 10 00:12:31 am Message-ID: > > On 3/17/2010 3:06 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > >> > >> On 3/16/2010 3:09 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > >>> What are you really trying to do? Waht is the machine you are taking the > >>> outputs from, and what are you trying to do with them? > >> > >> Trying to capture the output of a program running on an IBM 5160 that > >> only looks correct via CGA RGB output. > > > > Right. And what are you capturing it on? What inputs _exactly_ do you > > have? For example, do you have separate syncs, composite sync, or > > sync-on-green? > > I'm not sure I understand the question: There is no capture device made > that can do it, so I have no device to capture from. Ireally don't understand what you want to do. I understand you have a 5160 with a CGA card, and you want to use it with something other than the oriignal CGA monitor. My question is what is this 'something', what inputs does it have _precisely_. TO work out how to interface 2 things i generally have to know what those things are. The CGA card I know (darn it, I am using one here). The other device I have no idea on. -tony From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Mar 20 14:43:32 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 15:43:32 -0400 Subject: Finding datasheets on the net (was Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <773DAAF2-6336-4D5A-A824-ECACB27E391A@neurotica.com> On Mar 20, 2010, at 2:52 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> Google goes through phases where searching for a random TTL or CMOS >> or old microprocessor or transistor part number returns 95%+ >> sponsored >> spam links to places that don't have the part but want to sell you >> the part= >> anyway. > > I have never found any useful information on ICs using Google. As you > say, you get plenty of sites that claim they can sell you the IC.. Wow, I find pretty much any datasheet I need via Google in seconds, pretty much every day. WTF? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Mar 20 14:53:37 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 15:53:37 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <9DAE6CB3-8A63-4D67-8253-FFAC34FAC781@neurotica.com> On Mar 20, 2010, at 2:23 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >>> Err no. At one time we had these wonderful things called 'data >>> books' I'd >>> flip through them to see what chips were available, their featurs, >>> etc. I >>> bought a lot of said books. >> >> You can do that on their websites, without killing trees. (not > > No I can't (and this has nothing to do with the machine I run > here). Even > when I use a modern PC running something standard I find I can't 'flip > through' a website like I can flip through a data book. In fact I find > trying to read any sort of techncial documentation from a screen to be > very annoying.. > > Even with a modern machine and a fast internet connection it simply > takes > too ling to 'flip through' a collection of data sheets. That depends entirely on the design of the website. Tony, I don't mean to be insulting here, but it's simply ludicrous to assume that all new developments are evil simply because they are new. Dismissing things for that reason really is unbecoming of a person of your caliber. If you've ever actually TRIED this, without going into it under the assumption that it will fail (and thus finding a way to make it fail), making these sorts of statements is just plain silly. There's a whole world of engineers out there, some of whom are even almost as good as you are, who AREN'T hampered into uselessness because downloadable PDF files have largely replaced printed databooks. I am a book fanatic. I have a library in my house that contains well over a thousand books. NONE of them are fiction...they're all technical books. I love them. I also have a big shelf full of databooks, maybe 30-35 of them that I keep around, and about a hundred more in the closet that I haven't used in years. I LOVE books. I'm just as much of a book curmudgeon as you are. But now that mostly everything is available electronically, I find it FAR FAR FAR faster and easier to access it that way. And if I REALLY want it on paper, which I often do, I just print it. >> in seconds, rather than having to wait for weeks to find a copy of a >> databook that I don't have. I have nearly three thousand PDF > > There are 2 issues here. > > Firstly, there are components that I have used for which I can't > find the > data sheets in any archive on the web. An example would be the SAA5070 > (and yes it is used in classic computers). OK, _current_ device data > sheets are probably available, but I wonder if anyone is archiving > those. I do, whenever I download one. Data storage is cheap, I have effectively unlimited data storage capacity here, so I keep them. And there will always be chips for which there's no documentation available. That problem is NOT specific to electronic formats! > The second issue is that yes, I will agree that being able to download > data wheets is a Good Thing. But that doesn't mean this has to > _replace_ > data books. It is a very common falacy that because is better than > for some application, it has to be better for all applications > [1]. I don't think anyone ever said that. But you've been implying that PDF datasheets are USELESS, to EVERYONE, ALL THE TIME, FOREVER, and that they might just be the root of all evil. > And as for 'wait a few weeks', when I was buing databooks about 10 > or 20 > years ago, they generally came next day. Quite a few companies also > kept > archives of their old data sheets and would send a hptocopy next day > (free or for a nominal charge). When I was buying them 10 or 20 years ago, it took a few weeks, unless I was working for an organization that, for some reason, had the attention of a semiconductor manufacturer sales-droid who would bend over backwards in the hopes of getting a million-unit sale. Perhaps things are better in the UK in that department. >> datasheets now, and those are just for parts that I've been >> interested in for one reason or another. (curiosity, repair, use in >> new design, found a chip somewhere and wanted to know what it is, >> etc) I have about 35-40 databooks, and now I have FAR more useful >> information available to me then when I used to use those databooks >> regularly. >> >> Not all change is automatically bad. > > True, but I think this one is. And I am actually still trying to > think of > a change in the last 20 years that's been for the better... Oh good heavens. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Sat Mar 20 15:01:54 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 20:01:54 +0000 Subject: Finding datasheets on the net (was Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA529B2.2030606@philpem.me.uk> Shoppa, Tim wrote: > Lots of Windows installations have a zillion spyware things running that interfere > greatly with downloading the PDF after you find it. Sometimes these things > make you believe that they're actually toolbars, but they aren't. Usually the > download accelerators fall in this category too... launching 50 simultaneous > download sessions to fetch a 3 page datasheet is usually a big loss. I use a combination of DownThemAll and the Download Statusbar plugins for Firefox. DTA is great for grabbing a page full of linked files (I've seen instances where people have scanned >100-page manuals to PDF as individual pages... makes it a bit of a pain to get the whole document). It's also terrific for big files -- it supports resuming downloads and multipart downloading ("download acceleration"). I usually leave multipart turned off (it has basically no effect on ADSL), but the resume feature is terrific. Especially when your DSL connection decides to drop out 99.5% through downloading a Linux ISO... The Download Statusbar plugin gets rid of the blasted download window (and its annoying habit of stopping all your downloads when you close it) and moves it to the status bar. This tends to be better for small files (<20MB usually). > I know that I'm being OS-ist when I talk about Windows like that, but really > it's the unknowing users getting sucked into thinking "another toolbar? Hey, > I want that!" and "another download accelerator? Hey, I want that!" that > are at fault. I don't think it's *that* much of a generalisation. My mother and brother are incessant link-clickers. If it says "free stuff, click here, just keep clicking 'OK' when it gives you a security warning, this isn't a virus, honest!", they'll click the link. Net result being that the machine ends up turning into a virus-infested slush pile by the end of the day it was set up. I had to re-image my brother's XP machine six times in a week on one occasion. On the 6th occasion I imaged the machine and gave him a recovery DVD. "This will obliterate everything on your C drive, make sure anything important is backed up onto the fileserver." He ignored the warning, but that's another thing. It's not been as bad since he installed Windows 7, but I still have a recovery image on standby. My mother has gotten the hint that clicking random links will f00k a PC very quickly. I'm reasonably convinced that letting her loose on an XP machine isn't a Really Bad Idea. In any case, when she bought her new laptop (one of the Asus 1008HA netbooks), I gave her an Ubuntu Live CD to play with. She loves it -- to the point where a week later she asked me to install it on the hard drive. She still uses XP for a few things that don't work on Linux (notably web-based training and seminars) but >90% of the time she's using Ubuntu. Haven't had to do a reinstall in nearly a year, and she's only installing software from the main, well-known repositories (I think I turned multiverse on, then set up medibuntu). > When you see a web browser and literally 75% of the screen > is taken up by toolbars and download accelerators that really are actually > all spyware, something is seriously out of whack, but I'd estimate that probably > 90% of Windows PC's that are not vigilantly patrolled end up that way. 90% of the problem is the users.. even if they're told "don't click things like that", they will. IIRC it's called the "dancing bunnies problem" (also known as the "dancing pigs problem" or "dancing bears problem", depending on who you ask). Basically, many computer users, when presented with a button that says "click here to see the dancing bunnies", will click said button and dismiss any security alerts keeping them away from said bunnies. Move users onto Linux or OSX and the viruses stop working :) It probably helps that most Linux/OSX devs have better things to be doing than writing malware. The small market share relative to Windows is probably a factor, too. Go for the big, insecure target, or the little one that's armoured at least as well as Fort Knox? I know which one I'd pick... :) (Wasn't it OpenBSD who started harping on about there being "no security holes in the base install since $DATE", then having a huge kernel bug found a couple of weeks later? I think I'd counter with "but what can you do with the base install, anyway?" :-) ) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From cclist at sydex.com Sat Mar 20 15:05:07 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 13:05:07 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <9DAE6CB3-8A63-4D67-8253-FFAC34FAC781@neurotica.com> References: , <9DAE6CB3-8A63-4D67-8253-FFAC34FAC781@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4BA4C803.6172.FF092F@cclist.sydex.com> On 20 Mar 2010 at 15:53, Dave McGuire wrote: > And there will always be chips for which there's no documentation > available. That problem is NOT specific to electronic formats! Not particularly germane to the discussion, but I've occasionally stumbled on datasheets that no one else has on this site: http://www.dzsc.com/ic/pdf.html The Chinese seem to be accumulation their own collection. Good for them! --Chuck From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Sat Mar 20 15:39:12 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 21:39:12 +0100 Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM In-Reply-To: References: <961F34038CE248AB930C0CDD2FB21F2C@xp1800> from "Rik Bos" at Mar19, 10 10:29:50 pm Message-ID: <58E8592F656B4E6DA577C898F9077627@xp1800> > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Tony Duell > Verzonden: zaterdag 20 maart 2010 19:07 > Aan: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Onderwerp: Re: HP 2671 Graphics ROM > > > > > The 2671 has an empty socket on the HP-IB interface > board, the one > > > > closest to the printer PCB is empty. > > This sounds as though it might be a different cersion of the > HPIB board, but I'll give the numbers in a second. > > > Seems a good idea, I'll write down the part numbers so we > can compare. > > OK, I've dug my 2671G out and taken it apart. I find the > instructions on the bottom very amusing. They tell you 'no > user serviceable parts inside' > and then tell you just how to take the cover odd. Go figure... > > Anyway > > The PSU is a 02670-60070. I would be suprised if there are > any changes there. > > The HPIB interface is 02670-60072. U14 (2016 RAM) and U15 > (ROM) are not fitted. U2 (an 8049 microcontroller) is > 1820-2833. The DIP switches are set : > 1 Open (Mode) > 2 Open )2K) -- this has no effect if U15 is not fitted! > 3 Closed (Int ROM ) -- this means the 8049 will run from its > internal ROM > 4 Open (Test) > > The printer PCB (on the back of the thermaal print mechansim) > seems to be iether a 02760-60067 or 02670-80084. > > U3091 (8049) is 1820-3096 > U101 (ROM) is 1818-1819 > > There is a 10 way dIP switch set as follows : > 1 Open > 2 Open > 3 Closed > 4 Open > 5 CLosed > 6 Closed > 7 Open > 8 Closed > 9 Open > 10 Closed > > If I am reading the scheamtics properly : > > SW8 -> 8049 will run a program from it's internal ROM SW10 -> > power-fail or watchdog tinme-out will casue a rest Others -> > 8K esternal ROM (A12 is used), but note thatsince SW2 is > open, PSEN/ does not enable the ROM. This means that the ROM > is for data storage (font?) only, not for program code. > > Unfortunately I don't ahve an 8049 programmer at the moment. > It's something I must get roudn to buidling. Which means I > can't dump the microcotnrollers... > > -tony PSU is indeed the same, HP-IB board is the same 02670-60072 Rev.A ROM (U15) 02670-80078, Processor (U2)8039, (U13) Empty socket. Printerboard 02670-60084 ROM (U101) 1818-1819, Processor (U301) 8049 1820-2731. Dipswitches are the same, for as far I can see the difference is U301, the service manual speeks of replacing one chip. The interface boards seems to be field replaceble, in my opinion it make no sense to put the graphic rendering on the interface board. -Rik From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 20 15:38:31 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 20:38:31 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <9DAE6CB3-8A63-4D67-8253-FFAC34FAC781@neurotica.com> from "Dave McGuire" at Mar 20, 10 03:53:37 pm Message-ID: > > Even with a modern machine and a fast internet connection it simply > > takes > > too ling to 'flip through' a collection of data sheets. > > That depends entirely on the design of the website. I don't think it does. I've yet to use any computer (and I am not talking aobut my classics here) where I can 'turn the pages' of a PDF file as quickly as I an turn the pages of a book and still read enough information to know if I waant to stop and read that page more carefully. If I know I want a particular data sheet, then, yes, I can probalby (90% of the time or so) get it on the web. But if I don't know what data sheet I want, then a data book is going to be a lot easier for me. Recently I had a 40 pin LC with a Motorola logo and a house number. I could identify some of the connectiosn (power, data bus) on the board it was part of. I susepcted it was a microcontroller (this later turned out to be incorrect, BTW). Flipping through the applicable data books here took a few minutes (and alas I didn't find anything that made sense). I then spent an hour or more looking on the data sheet archive sites and eventually identified it. But it took a lot more time to do that than it would have done if I'd had that data hseet on paper. So, yes, the archive sites were very useful, in that I got the data in the end. But it would have been a lot easier if I'd had the data books on paper. > Tony, I don't mean to be insulting here, but it's simply ludicrous > to assume that all new developments are evil simply because they are > new. Dismissing things for that reason really is unbecoming of a I never said that. What I said, and I stand by, is that I can't thinkl of any new developemnt that has made _my_ life easier or better. I am very happy to consider new developments. > person of your caliber. If you've ever actually TRIED this, without FWIW, I get information off the web all the time. Often it's the only way I am going to get the information. But this doesn't mean it's the best way I can think of. > going into it under the assumption that it will fail (and thus > finding a way to make it fail), making these sorts of statements is > just plain silly. There's a whole world of engineers out there, some > of whom are even almost as good as you are, who AREN'T hampered into > uselessness because downloadable PDF files have largely replaced > printed databooks. The point is (at least for me) if you don';t know something is likely to exist, you're not going to spend time looking for it. I really don't ahve the time to look at every manufacturer's web site to see if there happens to be a chip that does what I want (as I keep on pointing out, 'flipping through pdf's takes an order of magnatude longer -- at least -- than 'flippiong throuhg books'). I'll stick to what I know will do the job. Btu many times with the paper data books I've thought 'Now that's a nice feature' and I've rememebred that Motorola or whoever make a chip that does something that's useful. And when I find I need that feautre, I rememebr which book it's in (even If I can't rememebr the number, I can probalby rememebr the basic functionality, so I am going to find said data sheet in a couple of minures).. Maybe you enjoy downloading one pdf after another and readingthem. I, alas, don't. I'll do it if I have to, but not if I don't. > > I am a book fanatic. I have a library in my house that contains > well over a thousand books. NONE of them are fiction...they're all > technical books. I love them. I also have a big shelf full of FWIW, me too. Actually way more than 1000. > databooks, maybe 30-35 of them that I keep around, and about a > hundred more in the closet that I haven't used in years. I LOVE > books. I'm just as much of a book curmudgeon as you are. But now > that mostly everything is available electronically, I find it FAR FAR > FAR faster and easier to access it that way. For me it depends on what I want it for. > > And if I REALLY want it on paper, which I often do, I just print it. > > >> in seconds, rather than having to wait for weeks to find a copy of a > >> databook that I don't have. I have nearly three thousand PDF > > > > There are 2 issues here. > > > > Firstly, there are components that I have used for which I can't > > find the > > data sheets in any archive on the web. An example would be the SAA5070 > > (and yes it is used in classic computers). OK, _current_ device data > > sheets are probably available, but I wonder if anyone is archiving > > those. > > I do, whenever I download one. Data storage is cheap, I have > effectively unlimited data storage capacity here, so I keep them. > > And there will always be chips for which there's no documentation > available. That problem is NOT specific to electronic formats! Ture enough, the obvious example being a custom device. But what worries me is when a device was a standard part, the data sheet was publisehd, but nobody botheres to archive it. And then 20 years later somebody needs that data sheet. > > > The second issue is that yes, I will agree that being able to download > > data wheets is a Good Thing. But that doesn't mean this has to > > _replace_ > > data books. It is a very common falacy that because is better than > > for some application, it has to be better for all applications > > [1]. > > I don't think anyone ever said that. But you've been implying > that PDF datasheets are USELESS, to EVERYONE, ALL THE TIME, FOREVER, > and that they might just be the root of all evil. I never said that. I simply stated that _for me_ it's a lot harder to see what interesting devices are availalbe if I don't have a printed data book. > > > And as for 'wait a few weeks', when I was buing databooks about 10 > > or 20 > > years ago, they generally came next day. Quite a few companies also > > kept > > archives of their old data sheets and would send a hptocopy next day > > (free or for a nominal charge). > > When I was buying them 10 or 20 years ago, it took a few weeks, > unless I was working for an organization that, for some reason, had > the attention of a semiconductor manufacturer sales-droid who would > bend over backwards in the hopes of getting a million-unit sale. > Perhaps things are better in the UK in that department. I was cleaerly very lucky, then. I wasn't an organisation at all, just a hobbyist or student. But just about every manufacturer I tried would send me a copy of the data sheet (no matter how old) next day. And if I asked about a data book, they would normally quote a price, I'd post them a cheque (I didn't ahve a credit card back then) and they'd sent it to me, noramlly without waitign for the cheque to clear. > >> Not all change is automatically bad. > > > > True, but I think this one is. And I am actually still trying to > > think of > > a change in the last 20 years that's been for the better... > > Oh good heavens. Well, OK, please name one change in the last 20 years that has made _my_ life better. -tony From derschjo at mail.msu.edu Sat Mar 20 16:19:07 2010 From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 14:19:07 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA53BCB.5060701@mail.msu.edu> Tony Duell wrote: >>> Even with a modern machine and a fast internet connection it simply >>> takes >>> too ling to 'flip through' a collection of data sheets. >>> >> That depends entirely on the design of the website. >> > > I don't think it does. I've yet to use any computer (and I am not talking > aobut my classics here) where I can 'turn the pages' of a PDF file as > quickly as I an turn the pages of a book and still read enough > information to know if I waant to stop and read that page more carefully. > I suppose it may be a question of definition; on my (admittedly modern) PC here I can flip pages in a PDF as fast as I can click the mouse (and they're readable just as fast) even for something as large as the 11/40 engineering drawings. I do agree that I prefer to have physical copies of documents where available, but for two different reasons: 1) somehow, skimming a physical document for something is just easier, and 2) I hate zooming in to see detail. Still, I don't stand a chance at getting physical copies of most of this unless I want to print it myself (I usually don't) so PDFs are very convenient in that regard... (What I want to solve #2 would be a super-high DPI screen... I have a 1920x1200 display, but it's still only 96 dpi. Something 200dpi or higher would be very nice (for things other than PDFs, too...) - Josh > -tony > > > From ggs at shiresoft.com Sat Mar 20 16:42:26 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 14:42:26 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA53BCB.5060701@mail.msu.edu> References: <4BA53BCB.5060701@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: <3F77D116-34FE-4187-BD7A-CCCDAD4CBE3E@shiresoft.com> On Mar 20, 2010, at 2:19 PM, Josh Dersch wrote: >> > I suppose it may be a question of definition; on my (admittedly modern) PC here I can flip pages in a PDF as fast as I can click the mouse (and they're readable just as fast) even for something as large as the 11/40 engineering drawings. I do agree that I prefer to have physical copies of documents where available, but for two different reasons: 1) somehow, skimming a physical document for something is just easier, and 2) I hate zooming in to see detail. Still, I don't stand a chance at getting physical copies of most of this unless I want to print it myself (I usually don't) so PDFs are very convenient in that regard... > > (What I want to solve #2 would be a super-high DPI screen... I have a 1920x1200 display, but it's still only 96 dpi. Something 200dpi or higher would be very nice (for things other than PDFs, too...) I have both hard copy & PDFs for most things that I work on. The PDFs take considerable *less* physical space than all of the paper. A cabinet maker friend of mine built me a bookcase specifically for all of the 11x17 binders that DEC put the prints into. It makes them *much* more accessible. I prefer to use the paper when I'm actually working on a machine. To help preserve the originals that I have, I typically print out a few pages that I might need from the PDFs when working on the actual HW. That way I also don't feel bad when I scribble notes on them. I typically use the PDFs for research/study (other than the source of work copies). I also am fortunate enough to have a 30" display with a 2560x1600 resolution. It's big enough and with enough resolution that I can typically view 11x17 pages full scale (actually I make them full screen which renders them slightly larger than full scale). I find it rare that I need to zoom in. TTFN - Guy From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Mar 20 17:02:06 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 18:02:06 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <3F77D116-34FE-4187-BD7A-CCCDAD4CBE3E@shiresoft.com> References: <4BA53BCB.5060701@mail.msu.edu> <3F77D116-34FE-4187-BD7A-CCCDAD4CBE3E@shiresoft.com> Message-ID: <3413A5CA-7765-42BD-AAC0-ABCA0368A0FD@neurotica.com> On Mar 20, 2010, at 5:42 PM, Guy Sotomayor wrote: > I have both hard copy & PDFs for most things that I work on. The > PDFs take considerable *less* physical space than all of the > paper. A cabinet maker friend of mine built me a bookcase > specifically for all of the 11x17 binders that DEC put the prints > into. It makes them *much* more accessible. > > I prefer to use the paper when I'm actually working on a machine. > To help preserve the originals that I have, I typically print out a > few pages that I might need from the PDFs when working on the > actual HW. That way I also don't feel bad when I scribble notes on > them. I do the same thing. I have hardcopy prints of a great many DEC systems and boards, but for me, it takes a lot less time to look in ~/ Documentation/DEC/pdp/xxx than to carefully sift through huge stacks of fragile 11x17 printouts. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Sat Mar 20 17:48:45 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 15:48:45 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update References: <4BA53BCB.5060701@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: <4BA550CC.78931C4@cs.ubc.ca> Josh Dersch wrote: > (What I want to solve #2 would be a super-high DPI screen... I have a > 1920x1200 display, but it's still only 96 dpi. Something 200dpi or > higher would be very nice (for things other than PDFs, too...) There was something to be said for the crispness of a good high-res B&W monitor where the resolution was limited more by the video bandwidth, rather than the physical tri-color-grid of colour monitors. When everything started going colour in the early 90's it occurred to me to hold onto a couple of larger B&W monitors as they went out of style, for working on text and schematics and such, but I never did get any. From aek at bitsavers.org Sat Mar 20 19:10:38 2010 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 17:10:38 -0700 Subject: Mark 8 / Apple I kits Message-ID: <4BA563FE.2020507@bitsavers.org> FYI obtronix has listed several sets of these kits on eBay 120546035352 120546028173 From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Mar 20 21:11:53 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 22:11:53 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA550CC.78931C4@cs.ubc.ca> References: <4BA53BCB.5060701@mail.msu.edu> <4BA550CC.78931C4@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <5696CC52-B686-45A2-A74B-090CC7C76ABE@neurotica.com> On Mar 20, 2010, at 6:48 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote: >> (What I want to solve #2 would be a super-high DPI screen... I have a >> 1920x1200 display, but it's still only 96 dpi. Something 200dpi or >> higher would be very nice (for things other than PDFs, too...) > > There was something to be said for the crispness of a good high-res > B&W monitor > where the resolution was limited more by the video bandwidth, > rather than the > physical tri-color-grid of colour monitors. > > When everything started going colour in the early 90's it occurred > to me to > hold onto a couple of larger B&W monitors as they went out of > style, for > working on text and schematics and such, but I never did get any. I have two white-phosphor VGA monitors, one 9" and one 15". I will never let them out of my sight for exactly this reason. :) -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ggs at shiresoft.com Sat Mar 20 21:40:47 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 19:40:47 -0700 Subject: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 In-Reply-To: <000e01cac47a$3bdf13d0$b39d3b70$@org> References: <001d01cac09b$8ba9b7e0$a2fd27a0$@jarratt@ntlworld.com> <4B983E43.8010600@e-bbes.com> <000e01cac47a$3bdf13d0$b39d3b70$@org> Message-ID: On Mar 15, 2010, at 1:00 PM, Julian Wolfe wrote: > I'd really prefer RP emulation. This would allow use of older OS versions. > I'd also really prefer to see a UNIBUS version. I'm planning on doing one that'll handle all of the disk types found on Unibus PDP11s (ie no MSCP). The design is sketched out. It's just finding the time... TTFN - Guy > > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] > On Behalf Of e.stiebler > Sent: Wednesday, March 10, 2010 6:50 PM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Solid State Disk replacement for RD53, 54, RK05, RL02/02 > > Rob Jarratt wrote: >> There was a thread recently on the comp.sys.dec newsgroup which ended up >> with the suggestion from David Riley that he would be prepared to build an >> FPGA-based board with a QBUS interface on one side and an SD interface on > > Is there really still interest in it ? > > I put my design away few years ago, as I didn't see anybody interested > enough to buy one. > There is the seasonal talk of it for sure, but ... > > OTOH, they old ones show up on ebay frequently, and they are not that > expensive. > > Remarks ? > > Cheers > > From derschjo at mail.msu.edu Sat Mar 20 22:38:54 2010 From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 20:38:54 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <5696CC52-B686-45A2-A74B-090CC7C76ABE@neurotica.com> References: <4BA53BCB.5060701@mail.msu.edu> <4BA550CC.78931C4@cs.ubc.ca> <5696CC52-B686-45A2-A74B-090CC7C76ABE@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4BA594CE.9080302@mail.msu.edu> Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 20, 2010, at 6:48 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote: >>> (What I want to solve #2 would be a super-high DPI screen... I have a >>> 1920x1200 display, but it's still only 96 dpi. Something 200dpi or >>> higher would be very nice (for things other than PDFs, too...) >> >> There was something to be said for the crispness of a good high-res >> B&W monitor >> where the resolution was limited more by the video bandwidth, rather >> than the >> physical tri-color-grid of colour monitors. >> >> When everything started going colour in the early 90's it occurred to >> me to >> hold onto a couple of larger B&W monitors as they went out of style, for >> working on text and schematics and such, but I never did get any. > > I have two white-phosphor VGA monitors, one 9" and one 15". I will > never let them out of my sight for exactly this reason. :) Honestly, while I can see the argument about color CRTs, I've never had a problem with the crispness of my LCD displays (at least when driven using a digital signal; analog VGA is another story). They're easily as crisp as the monochrome high-res CRT displays I have (PERQ, Sun, and Symbolics). Plus the refresh rate is better on my eyes, and they don't take up half my desk ;). - Josh > > > -Dave > From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Mar 20 23:34:31 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 00:34:31 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA594CE.9080302@mail.msu.edu> References: <4BA53BCB.5060701@mail.msu.edu> <4BA550CC.78931C4@cs.ubc.ca> <5696CC52-B686-45A2-A74B-090CC7C76ABE@neurotica.com> <4BA594CE.9080302@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: <66D96248-0C4E-4591-BF2C-581BCF078FE8@neurotica.com> On Mar 20, 2010, at 11:38 PM, Josh Dersch wrote: >>>> (What I want to solve #2 would be a super-high DPI screen... I >>>> have a >>>> 1920x1200 display, but it's still only 96 dpi. Something 200dpi or >>>> higher would be very nice (for things other than PDFs, too...) >>> >>> There was something to be said for the crispness of a good high- >>> res B&W monitor >>> where the resolution was limited more by the video bandwidth, >>> rather than the >>> physical tri-color-grid of colour monitors. >>> >>> When everything started going colour in the early 90's it >>> occurred to me to >>> hold onto a couple of larger B&W monitors as they went out of >>> style, for >>> working on text and schematics and such, but I never did get any. >> >> I have two white-phosphor VGA monitors, one 9" and one 15". I >> will never let them out of my sight for exactly this reason. :) > > Honestly, while I can see the argument about color CRTs, I've never > had a problem with the crispness of my LCD displays (at least when > driven using a digital signal; analog VGA is another story). > They're easily as crisp as the monochrome high-res CRT displays I > have (PERQ, Sun, and Symbolics). Plus the refresh rate is better on > my eyes, and they don't take up half my desk ;). I find the LCDs to be considerably crisper than the color CRTs and a joy to look at, but to my eye, a good monochrome CRT (like the early Sun monitors as used on the 3/50, 3/60, and similar machines) is even crisper when properly adjusted. I think that's probably a per-eye thing. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From trixter at oldskool.org Sun Mar 21 00:12:08 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 00:12:08 -0500 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA5AAA8.1000809@oldskool.org> On 3/20/2010 1:38 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> > Ireally don't understand what you want to do. I understand you have a > 5160 with a CGA card, and you want to use it with something other than > the oriignal CGA monitor. My question is what is this 'something', what > inputs does it have _precisely_. I wish to connect a device to the CGA RGB output that will convert it to something I can capture into a computer. Ideally that would be YCrCb as I have a betacam sp capture card that can do very nice 8/10/12-bit capture from an SD or HD source... but I'd settle for Y/C (s-video) at this point. -- 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 jhfinedp3k at compsys.to Sun Mar 21 07:15:09 2010 From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 07:15:09 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA60DCD.2020007@compsys.to> >Tony Duell wrote: >>Sorry to barge in, but I don't think is exactly correct. On most ARM >>systems these days, for >>example, there are multiple hardware breakpoints inside the jtag debug >>logic which are >>not intrusive. They don't perterb the instruction stream at all until >>they are hit. >> >No, you misunderstood me. A breakpoint is intrusive in that when it is >hit it stps the code execution (There are plenty of other debugging >feautrs in some chip,s but they're not strictly breakpoints). For tyhe >sort of thing I would use a microcontroller for (which involves >generating precisely timed signals to control external hardware) I can't >have my progrma suddenly being stopped for the debugger. > >A logic analyser will grabe state and not stop the program running. > > I have a slightly different way of looking at the situation, but I essentially agree with Tony. About a decade ago, I was attempting to determine why the data from a remote unit in the field was causing problems. Ultimately, the difficulty was due to a buffer overflow. Packets of data were sent to a buffer as they were generated followed by sending the data as soon as the previous packet was confirmed received. When the end of the buffer was reached, the start of the buffer was used as the continuation. Normally, the inflow of packets was much slower than the outflow speed, so no problems would ever occur. However, if an error was detected by the field unit, the error messages to be sent started to pile up. As Murphy's Law would dictate, the code to check that the packet to be overwritten by the inflow had been sent by the outflow was faulty, so the packets waiting to be sent were overwritten and corrupted. Since there was np way to stop the iteration between the remote units and the master station at precisely the same microsecond, let alone dump the contents of the remote's memory (it was just a single board with a CPU, Memory, EPROM and the minimum hardware to sense the field hardware), a logic analyser was used to capture the data packets and their address pointers as they were sent to the buffer and then moved from the buffer and sent to the master. Fortunately, the logic analyser was PC based and saved the snapshot on a hard drive for latter retrieval. The snapshot consisted to what were considered to be the values of the characters in the data packet and their locations in the buffer for a selected sequence of instructions which were able to show that the input pointer for data being stored into the buffer had crawled over the top of the output pointer for data being removed from the buffer. In effect, the logic analyser stops a specific sequence of instructions which started at a specified instruction in the code and froze the stored data for the previous bunch (probably about 100) instructions so that the data flow and buffer pointer values could be checked to be compatible. After MANY, MANY, MANY, ..., ..., attempts over a few days, a snapshot was found which identified the problem described above. In effect, what the logic analyser did was to display the results of stepping through about 100 instructions showing the data values and address pointers that were required as they were used by the program. This is exactly what a debugging session would be when a used to actually stop the program and then manually and visually inspects the values of interest. While the logic analyser is much more restrictive, its great advantage is that it does NOT change the timing of the operation since it captures any data it collects in real time and stores it in its own buffers outside of and apart from the system being tested without in any manner disturbing the system being tested by that observation. The logic analyser can do this because it is able to collect the data in its own buffer as the data is produced by the test system without regard as to when the trigger location or event in the system being tested will take place. When the event does occur, the logic analyser then takes a simple action. It stops accepting any more data and retains the snapshot of the previous bunch of instructions that preceded the event. It is like asking the breakpoint to take place at a certain location, then asking the system to reverse itself and run backwards to look at what HAD JUST HAPPENED during the previous 100 instructions. Obviously impossible to do with a breakpoint on the normal way, but that is how the logic analyser functions. Please correct my memory of how the logic analyser functions if I did not remember correctly - or if that is just one of the modes of operation. To accomplish to feat, the logic analyser probably has to run at least 10 times faster than the system being tested. (Tony, do you have any estimates?) With the fastest CPUs being used today, that is becoming increasingly MUCH more difficult. Tony, is that what you are concerned about as well, how the logic analysers are able to keep up? Jerome Fine From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to Sun Mar 21 07:16:17 2010 From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 07:16:17 -0500 Subject: Help with running RT-11 SAV files under RSTS/E In-Reply-To: References: <4B9FB253.2030403@compsys.to> <4BA02A96.9040101@compsys.to> <4BA1783C.9010507@compsys.to> <4BA273D1.8020904@compsys.to> <4BA39A91.8040207@compsys.to> Message-ID: <4BA60E11.8040809@compsys.to> >John A. Dundas III wrote: > >At 10:38 AM -0500 3/19/10, Jerome H. Fine wrote: > >> I am confused by some of your response to (b) and (c). Are you >> suggesting that >> because there are problems which occur in RT-11, but not in RSTS/E, >> the problems >> which occur in RT-11 should not be fixed? > > Definitely not. I am trying to point out where things that might be a > problem in RT are not necessarily a problem in RSTS, though. I see that we now agree. Fortunately, the environment under which the problems occur in RT-11 can be detected and will not impact the code when executing under RSTS. >> My goal is to provide a common utility which functions correctly >> under all OSs, >> not just RSTS/E or RT-11. TSX-PLUS has different issues as well. I can >> add code which solves the problems for RT-11, but since RSTS/E will >> likely >> be impacted, a few additional lines can prevent any impact on >> RSTS/E. As >> most programmers realize, when any changes are being made to a program, >> the additional effort of fixing other problems is much less than if >> done in a >> separate operation. > > Maybe. My approach would be to strictly limit (minimize) the amount > of change to that which is absolutely necessary to correct the defect, > thus minimizing the possibility of unintended consequences. I don't > know that that's necessarily different from your approach, maybe just > a different way of stating it. However, since any solution means that the new version has to either displace the old version or be located on a different device, I chose the latter alternative so that both could be used and the results compared until everyone is confident that the new code works correctly. Since I am unable to do the testing myself, this allows everyone who chooses to help verify the new code to do so with minimum risk since the new MACRO / CREF can be in the user's private storage. If that is not an advantage, then I agree that there is no point to keeping the old version. >> Still, even if a few extra lines of code are required for the >> transfer of control back and forth >> via the .Chain command between MACRO and CREF as the contents of a >> command file >> are processed when one or both of MACRO or CREF are not on the SY: >> device, I can't >> see that as a huge problem based on the flexibility that provides. > > All I'm saying is that this already works correctly under RSTS. > Caution should be exercised to not break what already works. I know > you're cautious. The starting point was that only a few minor aspects seem to need fixing: (a) The year in the date was only 2 digits. (b) The time of the compile was only to the minute - I wanted the same accuracy as the elapsed time (c) The elapsed time seems to be the nearest hundredth of a second, but was actually ticks since the number after the decimal point always looped from 00 to 59. Checking the code confirmed it was ticks. I already knew about the VBGEXE problems, so they were fixed as well. Suddenly, I realized that the RSTS use might not be compatible. Plus, I decided that there should be no reason why the files had to be on SY:, as I just explained above. To me, being cautious is allowing for testing against a known result over an extended time period without any impact if that is possible. >> By the way, I can't think of any other program that uses CREF except >> MACRO? Do >> you know of any? > > Sure. Could the linker and Fortran compilers could optionally use > it? [My memory is a bit hazy.] Other compilers did use it: BP2 [see > the /CROSS_REFERENCE switch], Pascal?, C [see the /CR switch], Cobol > [see the /CROSS_REFERENCE switch], and maybe other compilers used it > as well. I know many user-written utilities, including some of my > own, used it as it was a well documented interface. Under RT-11, the LINK and FORTRAN (also F77) compilers can all be off SY:, so they don't use CREF. I have not tested with C, but I don't think so either. Since I anticipated that RSTS might use CREF with other programs, I attempted to keep everything compatible. Maybe one day, it will actually be tested????? >> What I still don't know is how RSTS handles the .CStatus RT-11 EMT >> request. >> Would you be able to run a small test program under RSTS for me to >> determine >> that question. Or is there a downloadable RSTS image available that >> can run >> RSTS under SIMH available that I can use to test it myself? > > Yes. See the SIMH software site: > > I will give it a try. Actually, my preference right now is to execute the .SaveStatus followed by a .ReOpen if the environment is RT-11. This will only be done if the monitor is unmapped (bit 12 of offset 300 on a .GVal is zero). Otherwise, when a mapped monitor is present, skip both and go directly to the .CStatus to get the device for the program open on the overlay channel. >>>> There is also a final question about the information in the PDF on >>>> page 6-16 which states >>>> that bit 5 of offset 300 will always be zero. Are there no RSTS/E >>>> systems running where >>>> the power is 50 Hz rather than 60 Hz? Unless this omission has >>>> been corrected, but the >>>> documentation has not been updated? Otherwise, the TIME printed on >>>> the listing from >>>> MACRO.SAV will be incorrect if run under a 50 Hz system. Likewise >>>> for other programs >>>> which check bit 5 in offset 300 (the .GVal EMT request) and attempt >>>> to convert ticks to >>>> the time. >>> >>> Yes, RSTS runs on 50Hz systems, no problem, though I've never >>> personally done it. All I know is that RSTS attempts to present the >>> time value in a format RT expects (as it keeps time different >>> internally from RT). Maybe the ticks value IS wrong. Is it every >>> displayed? I just don't remember whether MACRO uses that in its >>> listings or not. >> >> Based on your explanation and the documentation in the PDF on page >> 6-16, my >> assumption is that RSTS converts all time quantities to ticks based >> on a 60 Hz >> clock. So even if the actual hardware is running at 50 Hz, the >> conversion into >> ticks to satisfy the .GTim EMT request does so based on a 60 Hz clock. > > I can't say that for certain. .GTIM will return a "reasonable" value. I don't think I made myself clear. My assumption is that RSTS provides the user of the .GTim RT-11 EMT request with a value that is correct for a 60 Hz clock even if the actual system is using a 50 Hz clock, then telling the user via bit 5 in offset 300 that a 60 Hz clock is present. That keeps everything compatible. >> Otherwise, the time of day at the top of each page in the listing >> would be >> noticeably less than the correct time near the end of the day, i.e. >> too few ticks >> would be calculated. > > No. The .GTIM value is recomputed each time it is requested. The > emulator performs a .DATE request to RSTS and then converts the values > into RT-11-expected quantities each time it is called. IF there is a > conversion error, it is more or less constant. I believe we are both saying exactly the same thing. The reason there is no conversion error is because the RT11 Run Time system under RSTS calculates ticks based on what a 60 Hz clock would generate and tells the user a 60 Hz clock is present. The user then converts ticks back to the correct time assuming a 60 Hz clock and gets the correct time. Seems sort of silly, but can't be done any other way, of course. >> Please let me know if you can run a small RT-11 program under RSTS to >> print the contents of the information provided by the .CStatus EMT >> request? > > You can perform this yourself with the software referenced above. I will certainly try. > According to the code .CSTATUS merely returns immediately to the > calling program without doing anything. I will make that assumption then since it seems like the correct solution. However, you do not mention if the CARRY bit is clear indicating no error or set indicating an error. I would tend to assume at least the latter since otherwise the user would attempt to use data that could cause a serious problem. Can you check the question of the CARRY bit status on return from RSTS for the .CStatus EMT request? > Hope this helps, This all helps quite a bit. In fact, without the PDF and your suggestions, I probably would not have been able to justify to myself, let alone others, the reasons for all of the extra code. THANK YOU!!!!!!!!! It seems like you have access to the source code for the RT11 Run Time system under RSTS? Is that the situation? Also, I have a few older V9.0 RSTS and Micro-RSTS manuals from around 1985 that I will likely toss within a year. How can I get them to you so they can be scanned? I also have a number of RT-11 manuals of V04.00 and early V05.00 and V05.01 manuals. Also I believe a full set of V05.05 of RT-11. Since your site has so many different versions of RSTS and RT-11 which are incomplete for most versions less than the latest distributions, I thought that the manuals may be interesting to you. Also, are you aware of anyone else who is still active in writing bug fixes and enhancements for RT-11? If anyone else actually is active, I have not found them at this point. Jerome Fine From ggs at shiresoft.com Sun Mar 21 10:48:13 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 08:48:13 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA60DCD.2020007@compsys.to> References: <4BA60DCD.2020007@compsys.to> Message-ID: <1FC7AC62-B3AE-4DA8-BBD9-996A1E303DCA@shiresoft.com> On Mar 21, 2010, at 5:15 AM, Jerome H. Fine wrote: > >Tony Duell wrote: > >>> Sorry to barge in, but I don't think is exactly correct. On most ARM systems these days, for >>> example, there are multiple hardware breakpoints inside the jtag debug logic which are >>> not intrusive. They don't perterb the instruction stream at all until they are hit. >>> >> No, you misunderstood me. A breakpoint is intrusive in that when it is hit it stps the code execution (There are plenty of other debugging feautrs in some chip,s but they're not strictly breakpoints). For tyhe sort of thing I would use a microcontroller for (which involves generating precisely timed signals to control external hardware) I can't have my progrma suddenly being stopped for the debugger. >> >> A logic analyser will grabe state and not stop the program running. >> > > In effect, what the logic analyser did was to display the results of stepping > through about 100 instructions showing the data values and address pointers > that were required as they were used by the program. This is exactly what > a debugging session would be when a used to actually stop the program and > then manually and visually inspects the values of interest. While the logic > analyser is much more restrictive, its great advantage is that it does NOT > change the timing of the operation since it captures any data it collects > in real time and stores it in its own buffers outside of and apart from the > system being tested without in any manner disturbing the system being > tested by that observation. The logic analyser can do this because it > is able to collect the data in its own buffer as the data is produced by the > test system without regard as to when the trigger location or event in the > system being tested will take place. When the event does occur, the logic > analyser then takes a simple action. It stops accepting any more data and > retains the snapshot of the previous bunch of instructions that preceded > the event. It is like asking the breakpoint to take place at a certain location, > then asking the system to reverse itself and run backwards to look at what > HAD JUST HAPPENED during the previous 100 instructions. Obviously > impossible to do with a breakpoint on the normal way, but that is how the > logic analyser functions. > > Please correct my memory of how the logic analyser functions if I did > not remember correctly - or if that is just one of the modes of operation. > > To accomplish to feat, the logic analyser probably has to run at least 10 times > faster than the system being tested. (Tony, do you have any estimates?) > With the fastest CPUs being used today, that is becoming increasingly MUCH > more difficult. Tony, is that what you are concerned about as well, how the > logic analysers are able to keep up? We have (spread across a number of labs) some bus analyzers for the current crop (actually the just previous generation) of Intel CPUs. They are *hairy* beasts (a rack full of equipment + cables that bury the MLB). We take the systems to debug to them (the analyzers just aren't portable in any stretch of the imagination) and it usually takes about a day to get them set up. The fact that they can actually capture (reliably) the information flowing across a bus at 1066MHz is amazing. They cost in the neighborhood of $500K each. They're a bit of a pain to use (mostly due to mechanical & electrical setup) so we tend to use them only after we've spent considerable time debugging via other methods. What we usually find is that there's some corner case issue with the bus protocol. TTFN - Guy From ray at arachelian.com Sun Mar 21 11:05:17 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 12:05:17 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> Andrew Burton wrote: > Leaving a computer running 24/7 may not harm the hardware as much, but it > harms the evironment and your electricity bill. We always shut our computers > down at work at the end of the day, or when they are finished with. I never > leave my laptop on all the time, since I only use it a few hours each day. I > certainly disconnect from the internet when I don't need website, Gopher or > BBS access. Surely you've heard of wake-on-LAN, and sleep/standby or even suspend/hibernate. Surely you've heard of power management, you know, spin down disks whenever possible, shut down the display after 10 minutes, sleep after 30 minutes, that sort of thing? I hear these things are available even for virus infectable and registry laden operating systems. These are generally considered solved problems at this point. If we're talking about a notebook, surely that's only a few watts - 85W for mine, as an example. I've seen some modern "gaming" desktops use 450W or even more, I could understand those being a problem, but a notebook? Myself, I use the notebook as the main machine, but I've also got a PPC Mac mini I use as a file server, plus another machine running openbsd as a router. Together, they both use less electricity than my fridge. Since the mini connects to its external drives over firewire, it can spin them down when they're not in use. It's possible this can be done over USB2, but I really prefer firewire over USB since it's closer to SCSI, and doesn't require hubs. Plus I've had bad luck with USB drives when connecting through hubs. At some point soon, if I find a nice small x86 box capable of running Solaris 10 properly, and not consume too much, I'll retire the mini and reformat its drives with ZFS. But for now it does the job very nicely. I do have some more hungry desktop/server class machines (Solaris SPARC, IBM Power, etc.), but I generally don't power them on unless I need them. There are of course the classic computers in the collection, but as I don't use them 24/7, they only get powered on when needed. Most don't consume too much as they're little 8 bit machines, but a couple are bit on the hefty side. > Less chance of a virus infecting my laptop then. > Running an infectable operating system is a different problem, but one that has a very easy solution. :-) > My laptop currently takes 10 minutes to boot (including everything loading > after logging in). Mine takes less than 2 seconds to wake from sleep, and when it comes back online, everything is where I left it, ready to go, I don't have to relaunch any apps. Most of the time my ssh sessions are still there and connected. If not, RSA keys and screen make short work of that issue. Shutting down is far too inconvenient. If you add up all the time it takes to shut down, restart, relaunch everything every day, you'll find you're giving a significant chunk of your life in service to a machine which should be serving you instead. Life's too short to waste on such acrobatics. Old, or new, use the technology such that it works in your favor, not against it. > I do need to do a registry cleanout though[1], which is > lucky that I have a week off in April. Plenty of time to get all the > 'little' jobs done :) > Again, if running an OS that has a registry is problematic, that problem has a very easy solution. :) From brad at heeltoe.com Sun Mar 21 11:43:49 2010 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 12:43:49 -0400 Subject: semi-OT: do you routinely attempt projects out of your comfort zone? In-Reply-To: <4BA4F363.8050201@verizon.net> (sfid-20100320_121316_167231_4007BDBF) References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> <4B99458B.6000409@philpem.me.uk> (sfid-20100311_145056_600573_5F1B2CDD) <4BA4F363.8050201@verizon.net> (sfid-20100320_121316_167231_4007BDBF) Message-ID: <4BA64CC5.1030005@heeltoe.com> Keith wrote: > > When you talk about courses via the web, are you referring to stuff > like MIT's OCW, or ? yes, exactly. > Is this by Mark Gordon Arnold from 1998? I always wonder about older > books. If they are the defacto reference standard, it's one thing. I > sometimes think that if they are generic enough to still apply, it's > not specific enough to my boards/environment/current language > standards to help. I don't think the fundamentals of logic design have changed in the last 50 years. Others may disagree. Metastability is still metastability. And Mealy and Moore have not changed (not since the 1950's). No one does logic reduction by hand any more, but you should learn how to do it anyway (my opinion), since will cement some important concepts in your mind. > If I'm working on classic computer stuff, then much of material is > old, so then the associated books are old too. I would not worry about age. The things that have changed don't matter to you (yet). Basically things just go faster and there are a lot more transistors. But the fundamentals are the same on a 1970 pdp-11 and 2010 Pentium. The clock domain crossing problems which occured in 1970 still happen today (trust me, I just spent all of last week helping debug some domain crossing issues on an FPGA). From what I have seen, logic design books like "Mick and Brick" are still as valid today as they were when they where written. Now I will make one caveat. A lot of the early DEC designs used pulse or asynchronous logic. I would avoid that. I would stick with completely synchronous design. So, if you are reading an old book and it talks about async design, I'd skip that part. Certainly anything from Mick & Brick on is fully synchronous. -brad From nig.bailey at virgin.net Sat Mar 20 15:40:13 2010 From: nig.bailey at virgin.net (Nigel Bailey) Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2010 20:40:13 +0000 Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM Message-ID: <4BA532AD.4060508@virgin.net> I don't know where you are tony, but I have the right pod on my old stag to do 80/8749s I'm in luton. From jonas at otter.se Sun Mar 21 08:50:33 2010 From: jonas at otter.se (Jonas Otter) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 14:50:33 +0100 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <000b01cac8fd$7a8b48b0$6fa1da10$@se> On Sat, 20 Mar 2010 20:38:31 +0000 (GMT), ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote: > Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Message-ID: > Content-Type: text/plain > ... > > Well, OK, please name one change in the last 20 years that has made > _my_ > life better. > > -tony > I don't know what your health is like, but should you get high blood pressure, or a hernia, I can assure you that the medicine/surgery you will get will be much better than what was available 20 years ago. Or even having some procedure done by a dentist. And personally, I find that modern mobile phones and new services available on the Internet (on-line banking, for example) have made *my* life a lot easier (and better). /Jonas From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sun Mar 21 14:52:11 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 13:52:11 -0600 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <000b01cac8fd$7a8b48b0$6fa1da10$@se> References: <000b01cac8fd$7a8b48b0$6fa1da10$@se> Message-ID: <4BA678EB.8000408@jetnet.ab.ca> Jonas Otter wrote: > I don't know what your health is like, but should you get high blood > pressure, or a hernia, I can assure you that the medicine/surgery you will > get will be much better than what was available 20 years ago. Or even having > some procedure done by a dentist. And personally, I find that modern mobile > phones and new services available on the Internet (on-line banking, for > example) have made *my* life a lot easier (and better). True, but I am guessing at $1.00 proft on each transaction, the banks find it better too! > /Jonas > > From derschjo at mail.msu.edu Sun Mar 21 15:28:42 2010 From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 13:28:42 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <4BA6817A.5010605@mail.msu.edu> Ray Arachelian wrote: > Andrew Burton wrote: > > At some point soon, if I find a nice small x86 box capable of running > Solaris 10 properly, and not consume too much, I'll retire the mini and > reformat its drives with ZFS. But for now it does the job very nicely. > I recently built myself a server based on this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813121399&cm_re=d510_motherboard-_-13-121-399-_-Product It's an Intel Atom D510 (dual core, 64-bit) based system, and it the entire system draws about 20 watts at peak load. Best of all it cost me about $230 total (w/shipping) to build (w/500gb drive and 2gb of RAM and a modestly priced case). I even have it running a "registry laden" operating system and it manages to boot in significantly less than 10 minutes :). I don't know what Solaris 10's hardware support looks like these days on x86 machines, but if you're looking for something low power, something like this might be the way to go. - Josh From ploopster at gmail.com Sun Mar 21 15:34:28 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 16:34:28 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <4BA682D4.6080104@gmail.com> Ray Arachelian wrote: > If we're talking about a notebook, surely that's only a few watts - 85W > for mine, as an example. I've seen some modern "gaming" desktops use > 450W or even more, I could understand those being a problem, but a notebook? No gaming box I've ever seen uses 450W at idle. Those kinds of power ratings are usually taken under full load. Peace... Sridhar From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 21 14:13:13 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:13:13 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP equivalents lists -- warning! Message-ID: I am sure everyone here who fixes old HP stuff knows of the equivalents lists that were published in Bench Briefs (which are now on the web). Today I was looking at aboard from an HP tape drive. I was pretty sure the 40 pin chip with a Motorola logo and an HP 1820-xxxx number was some flavour of 6809, but I couldn't rememebr what speed of whether it was an -E version, so I grabbed the latest equivalent list. I wasn't listed... But I was sure I recognised the number, so I looked in my older list. It was there. A 68B09. I also found a device I was looking at the other day, and which I suspected was a microcontroller (and isn't in the latest list) is listed in the older one as a 68488 ()which is what I deduced it to be after spending several hours downloading data sheets from the web and trying to match up pinouts). Argh! So a warning : Devices are sometimes removed from this equivalents list. You need to check all of them to see if it's listed anywhere. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 21 14:18:42 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:18:42 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA53BCB.5060701@mail.msu.edu> from "Josh Dersch" at Mar 20, 10 02:19:07 pm Message-ID: > I suppose it may be a question of definition; on my (admittedly modern) > PC here I can flip pages in a PDF as fast as I can click the mouse (and > they're readable just as fast) even for something as large as the 11/40 > engineering drawings. I do agree that I prefer to have physical copies > of documents where available, but for two different reasons: 1) somehow, > skimming a physical document for something is just easier, and 2) I hate > zooming in to see detail. Still, I don't stand a chance at getting I think, actually, we're in agreement here. We both think that a physical paper document is easier to skim, and it's easier to examine closely (without having to select and zoom). I would also argue it's easier to handle a paper document on the bench or stacked on top of the minicomputer you're repairing. I certainly agree that having the information electroncially is better than not having the information at all. Of course it is. As I've said repeatedly, data sheet archive sites and achives of old manuals (bitsavers, Australian HP museum -- add the ones for your favourite machines), are very, very, useful. I have got a lot of useful information from them (and indirectly contributed to at least one). But I still wich I could buy modern IC databooks... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 21 14:30:31 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:30:31 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <3F77D116-34FE-4187-BD7A-CCCDAD4CBE3E@shiresoft.com> from "Guy Sotomayor" at Mar 20, 10 02:42:26 pm Message-ID: > I have both hard copy & PDFs for most things that I work on. The PDFs = > take considerable *less* physical space than all of the paper. A = I generally need the complete manual anyway, if only to be sure I am not missing something important (OK, I probably don't need the page that wanrs me there are dangerous voltages in the PSU, but I would estimate that I do need about 99% of all the service manual pages). Which means I either print out the complete manual every time I need it and then put it in the recycling box (which seems to be very wasteful of paper and toner, not to mention time), or I file and keep the printout. Which is just as much to store as the original paper manual. > cabinet maker friend of mine built me a bookcase specifically for all of = > the 11x17 binders that DEC put the prints into. It makes them *much* = > more accessible. Since A3 binders are ridiculously expensive over here, I fold the pages down to A4. Fold them in half, then fole the top half back again to get an A4 page with 2 thickness at the 'binding' side and 3 thickness at the 'free' side. Then they will fit in a normal binder. > > I prefer to use the paper when I'm actually working on a machine. To = > help preserve the originals that I have, I typically print out a few = As an aside, some of the pages in the steering section of my Citroen BX workshop manaul are stained bright green. I am sure Rik will understand why :-) > pages that I might need from the PDFs when working on the actual HW. = > That way I also don't feel bad when I scribble notes on them. If I am recoding the fact that my machine doesn't exactly match the manual (that is, I have a different version), then I simply annotate or change the manual. If I am adding changes or explainatiuon I've worked out, then I make a photocopy of the appropriate page and annotate that, amd then file it in the manaul. I also add pages of my own test results (for monitors, I always record the CRT pin voltages, for example). > > I typically use the PDFs for research/study (other than the source of = > work copies). I also am fortunate enough to have a 30" display with a = > 2560x1600 resolution. It's big enough and with enough resolution that I Fortunate, indeed. I don't know how much a 30" monitor would cose, and I don't kno how much it would cost to keep it running for, say, 20 years, but I am sure of one thing -- it's more than I could afford... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 21 14:33:16 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:33:16 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA594CE.9080302@mail.msu.edu> from "Josh Dersch" at Mar 20, 10 08:38:54 pm Message-ID: > Honestly, while I can see the argument about color CRTs, I've never had > a problem with the crispness of my LCD displays (at least when driven I have used PCs with LCD (I assume) montiors where the image was noticeably unsharp. It wasn't the file I was viewing, becuase it could be displayed pin-sharp on another machine. I don;'t know if the problem was the monitor or the video card (insuffiicent bandwidth in the RAMDAC or output stage?) or what (it wasn't my machine, I didn't have a chance to invetigate), but it certainly can happen. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 21 14:08:15 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:08:15 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM In-Reply-To: <58E8592F656B4E6DA577C898F9077627@xp1800> from "Rik Bos" at Mar 20, 10 09:39:12 pm Message-ID: > PSU is indeed the same, HP-IB board is the same 02670-60072 Rev.A ROM (U15) > 02670-80078, Processor (U2)8039, (U13) Empty socket. DO you mean U13 is empty? What about U14? Is there a 2K*8 RAM (2016, 6116) on this board at all? > Printerboard 02670-60084 ROM (U101) 1818-1819, Processor (U301) 8049 > 1820-2731. > Dipswitches are the same, for as far I can see the difference is U301, the I assume the DIP swithc on the HPIB board is set differently because your board uses an external ROM and mine doesn't. > service manual speeks of replacing one chip. Right. Sounds like I'd better have a go at buildign a device to read out 8049s... > The interface boards seems to be field replaceble, in my opinion it make no > sense to put the graphic rendering on the interface board. I think it was actually user-changeaable (you could swap the interface board if your needs changed), rather like the HP7225 plotter. You just undo 2 screws on the back and slide the board out -- without even taking the case cover off. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 21 14:39:03 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:39:03 +0000 (GMT) Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: <4BA5AAA8.1000809@oldskool.org> from "Jim Leonard" at Mar 21, 10 00:12:08 am Message-ID: > > On 3/20/2010 1:38 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > >> > > Ireally don't understand what you want to do. I understand you have a > > 5160 with a CGA card, and you want to use it with something other than > > the oriignal CGA monitor. My question is what is this 'something', what > > inputs does it have _precisely_. > > I wish to connect a device to the CGA RGB output that will convert it to > something I can capture into a computer. Ideally that would be YCrCb as > I have a betacam sp capture card that can do very nice 8/10/12-bit > capture from an SD or HD source... but I'd settle for Y/C (s-video) at > this point. I would avoid S-vidoe, I suspect even with separate Y and C thare's a possibility of of colour problems SO what you actually want is Y (including composite sync), R-Y and B-Y? Originally you were talking aobut analouge RGB. I am also wondeiring if you could capture the digital data as it comes out of the CGA card. It's not that high a data rate, and it seems rather perverse to take digital signals, comvert them to analogue and then redigitse them again. [I find the VGA inoptu on our LCD TV to be a bit silly. The data sexists in digitla form in the computer, you turn it into analogue signals to fied to the TV, and then redigitse them for display. Why?] -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 21 15:18:05 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 20:18:05 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA60DCD.2020007@compsys.to> from "Jerome H. Fine" at Mar 21, 10 07:15:09 am Message-ID: > In effect, what the logic analyser did was to display the results of > stepping > through about 100 instructions showing the data values and address pointers > that were required as they were used by the program. This is exactly what > a debugging session would be when a used to actually stop the program and > then manually and visually inspects the values of interest. While the logic > analyser is much more restrictive, its great advantage is that it does NOT I woudln't necessarily claim it's more restrictive, rather that it's another tool you can use. Sometimes softwere debuggers, softwear breakpoints (that stop the program under test runnign when some codition is met and let you exampine memory, CPU registers, etc) is a more appropriate way, sometimes it's not. > change the timing of the operation since it captures any data it collects > in real time and stores it in its own buffers outside of and apart from the > system being tested without in any manner disturbing the system being > tested by that observation. The logic analyser can do this because it Basically a logic analyser is like a multiple-channel storage 'scope for digital signals. Unlike a normal 'scope it doesn';t record the voltages of the signals, it just records whether they are a logic '0' or a logic '1' (the logic threshold can generally be set so the inturment can be used with TTL, CMOS (at various supply voltags, ECL, etc). > is able to collect the data in its own buffer as the data is produced by the > test system without regard as to when the trigger location or event in the > system being tested will take place. When the event does occur, the logic Yes, a logic analyser shouldn't have any effect on the device under test. > analyser then takes a simple action. It stops accepting any more data and > retains the snapshot of the previous bunch of instructions that preceded > the event. It is like asking the breakpoint to take place at a certain > location, What happens is that the analyse stores the state of it's inputs at regualr time interface (perhaps every 50ns, or every 1us, or ...) It stores the last samples in an intenral buffer memory (n> depends on the instrument, it might be 1024 samples for an old analyser like the one I use.When it gets a trigger it will then take a certain further number of smaples and then stop recording. If that 'further number' is 0, then you get 1023 samples of what happened before the trigger event. if it's 1024, then you get the trigger event and what happened after it. If it's 512, then you get a a recording with the rigger event in the middle. Some analysers let you select the exact number of samples to take after the trigger before stopping, others just give you the 3 choices I've mentioned (start, end, middle), but that's notmally enough > then asking the system to reverse itself and run backwards to look at what > HAD JUST HAPPENED during the previous 100 instructions. Obviously > impossible to do with a breakpoint on the normal way, but that is how the > logic analyser functions. Exactly. And thgt's why the logic analyser can be more useful than a breakpoint. > > Please correct my memory of how the logic analyser functions if I did > not remember correctly - or if that is just one of the modes of operation. See above for the basic 'capture modes' -- what the analyser does when it's recording. When you look at the data, most analysers will display it as a timing diagram (which is what you want when debugging hardware problems), often you can also display it as a table of 1's and 0's, possible also in hex or ovtal, or ASCII cahracters, or... Many instruments either include a computer or can be interfces to a computer so you can run a dissaembler o nythe recorded data and actually see what instructions were being executed. > > To accomplish to feat, the logic analyser probably has to run at least > 10 times > faster than the system being tested. (Tony, do you have any estimates?) It depends on the system. If the analyser allows and external clock signal for recording (many do), and you have a suitable cycle strobe in the system under test you can get away with an anlyser that's only as fast as the machine you're working on. For example, I often use my analyser to trace microcode flow in old minicomputers. I know the microcode program counter can only change on a particular edge or a steady clock signal. I use that signal to clock the analyser -- but on the other edge (so the microcode program ocunter outputs are stable when the analyser is trying to record them). For other systems you haven't got a suitable clock to do that with. You have to use the built0-in clock circuit of the logic analyser, which won;'t be synchonieed to the system you're working on. So you ahve to run the analyser considerably faster than the data rate of the machine under test. I would think that 10 times was certainly fast enough. > With the fastest CPUs being used today, that is becoming increasingly MUCH > more difficult. Tony, is that what you are concerned about as well, how the > logic analysers are able to keep up? That is certainly a problem (it's one reason I don't have a fast computer, I can't afford a fast enough logic analyser to maintain it), but it's not the problem I was thinking of here. I was thinking for farily traditional microcontrollers executing perhaps 20 million instructions per second at most. That is a rate that most logic analysers can keep up with. But the problem is that if the processor and program memory are on the same chip, there is no way of conencting the analyser to the address and data buses so it can see what's going on. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 21 16:31:15 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 21:31:15 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM In-Reply-To: <4BA532AD.4060508@virgin.net> from "Nigel Bailey" at Mar 20, 10 08:40:13 pm Message-ID: > > I don't know where you are tony, but I have the right pod on my old stag > to do 80/8749s I'm in luton. Thanks for the offer I'm in south-west London. It's possible I could bring the chip up to Luton (needless to say I am not going to trust the postal 'service' with this), but maybe I should just build something to do it myself. I am likrly to need to do it again sometime... Come to think of it, I think one of my programmers had an option for programming and reading 8049s, and I think the scheamtics of all the adapters are in the manual. I will take a look... -tony From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Sun Mar 21 16:46:08 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 22:46:08 +0100 Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM In-Reply-To: References: <58E8592F656B4E6DA577C898F9077627@xp1800> from "Rik Bos" at Mar20, 10 09:39:12 pm Message-ID: <535C65F1C49149569F53CDDC83C3AE68@xp1800> > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Tony Duell > Verzonden: zondag 21 maart 2010 20:08 > Aan: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Onderwerp: Re: HP 2671 Graphics ROM > > > PSU is indeed the same, HP-IB board is the same 02670-60072 > Rev.A ROM > > (U15) 02670-80078, Processor (U2)8039, (U13) Empty socket. > > DO you mean U13 is empty? What about U14? Is there a 2K*8 RAM (2016, > 6116) on this board at all? Yes U13 is empty, U14 are empty holes. No RAM at all on the board, the dipswitch 2K is open too. So I suppose I can place a 6116 in the U13 socket, and switch the 2K dipswitch to closed, to have the advantage of a smal hp-ib buffer. Should speed up data transfer a little.. > > Printerboard 02670-60084 ROM (U101) 1818-1819, Processor > (U301) 8049 > > 1820-2731. > > Dipswitches are the same, for as far I can see the > difference is U301, > > the > > I assume the DIP swithc on the HPIB board is set differently > because your board uses an external ROM and mine doesn't. > > > service manual speeks of replacing one chip. > > Right. Sounds like I'd better have a go at buildign a device > to read out 8049s... Would be nice.. > > > The interface boards seems to be field replaceble, in my > opinion it make no > > sense to put the graphic rendering on the interface board. > > I think it was actually user-changeaable (you could swap the > interface Yes that's what I mean. > board if your needs changed), rather like the HP7225 plotter. > You just > undo 2 screws on the back and slide the board out -- without > even taking > the case cover off. > > -tony -Rik From ggs at shiresoft.com Sun Mar 21 17:13:53 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 15:13:53 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mar 21, 2010, at 12:30 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > >> pages that I might need from the PDFs when working on the actual HW. = >> That way I also don't feel bad when I scribble notes on them. > > If I am recoding the fact that my machine doesn't exactly match the > manual (that is, I have a different version), then I simply annotate or > change the manual. If I am adding changes or explainatiuon I've worked > out, then I make a photocopy of the appropriate page and annotate that, > amd then file it in the manaul. I also add pages of my own test results > (for monitors, I always record the CRT pin voltages, for example). I think we all agree that when actually working on the machines paper is best! :-) > >> >> I typically use the PDFs for research/study (other than the source of = >> work copies). I also am fortunate enough to have a 30" display with a = >> 2560x1600 resolution. It's big enough and with enough resolution that I > > Fortunate, indeed. I don't know how much a 30" monitor would cose, and I > don't kno how much it would cost to keep it running for, say, 20 years, > but I am sure of one thing -- it's more than I could afford... Yea it was expensive (the whole machine it's connected to was frighteningly expensive...I've purchased new cars that cost considerably less...but that's another story). Hopefully it'll last a while. It's an LCD so the thing that's most likely to fail are the cold cathode florescent tubes used for the backlight. I suspect that the LED versions of these displays will last forever assuming the panel doesn't get damaged physically. TTFN - Guy From trixter at oldskool.org Sun Mar 21 17:33:06 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 17:33:06 -0500 Subject: RGB-VGA Converter -- buy or build? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA69EA2.4080001@oldskool.org> On 3/21/2010 2:39 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> > SO what you actually want is Y (including composite sync), R-Y and B-Y? As a fallback to your interesting idea (see below). > I am also wondeiring if you could capture the digital data as it comes > out of the CGA card. It's not that high a data rate, and it seems rather > perverse to take digital signals, comvert them to analogue and then > redigitse them again. RGB TTL, as implemented on IBM CGA+5153 monitor, is capable of producing a visible display area of 640x200x60x4=30720000 bits of information a second, which would be under 4mbytes a second, so technically you're right, it's not much data to capture. It's more than that due to overscan and retrace, of course, but even with overhead it's reasonable. I had never thought of that as an option. It's still beyond my abilities to design and implement, but that would clearly be the very best option. > [I find the VGA inoptu on our LCD TV to be a bit silly. The data sexists > in digitla form in the computer, you turn it into analogue signals to > fied to the TV, and then redigitse them for display. Why?] As an extra option for legacy hookups. You're never supposed to use that if your output device supports HDMI or DVI etc. -- 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 classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Sun Mar 21 18:09:29 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 23:09:29 +0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA6817A.5010605@mail.msu.edu> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <4BA6817A.5010605@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: <4BA6A729.6090208@philpem.me.uk> Josh Dersch wrote: > I recently built myself a server based on this: ... > It's an Intel Atom D510 (dual core, 64-bit) based system, and it the > entire system draws about 20 watts at peak load. Best of all it cost me > about $230 total (w/shipping) to build (w/500gb drive and 2gb of RAM and > a modestly priced case). I've got a similar machine acting as my home server. Jetway JNC92 motherboard running an Atom N270 (single-core with HyperThreading) at 1.6GHz, with 2GB of RAM and a pair of 500GB drives in a RAID-1 array. It's all packed into a 1U rackmount case, and I've tweaked it for low noise -- basically I wired the case fan (a Sunon squirrel-cage blower) up to a Zalman fan speed controller that was left over from a PC build. After that, I got rid of the noisy little power supply (complete with fully-custom mounting bracket, ick) and replaced it with a 90W PicoPSU. It's a lovely machine, but the hard drives whine a bit -- hardly surprising given that they were "liberated" from one of my old desktop builds and have 14862 and 10670 hours on their life counters (for sda and sdb respectively). When I've got some spare cash, I'll be replacing them with 1TB Western Digital Caviar-GP (GreenPower) drives; from past experience I know they're A LOT quieter than the Seagate Barracuda 7200s I'm using now. Heck, even the pair of Caviar RE2s in my desktop (though in performance terms it's probably closer to a workstation) are quieter than the Barracuda, and the RE2s are server drives... Reason I used those was because I used to have a RAID set up, which I've since dismantled (having one physical drive for WinXP and one for Linux just seems tidier to me). > I don't know what Solaris 10's hardware support looks like > these days on x86 machines, From what I've heard and been told, it's pretty dire. Frankly if I was told to set up a server without using Linux, I'd probably go with one of the BSDs... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Mar 21 18:12:00 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:12:00 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5DFD5902-AE6C-4320-8BFE-D3126938EF1A@neurotica.com> On Mar 21, 2010, at 3:33 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> Honestly, while I can see the argument about color CRTs, I've >> never had >> a problem with the crispness of my LCD displays (at least when driven > > I have used PCs with LCD (I assume) montiors where the image was > noticeably unsharp. It wasn't the file I was viewing, becuase it > could be > displayed pin-sharp on another machine. If they're consumer-grade PC displays, then yes, they likely do suck. I've seen a few consumer-grade LCDs that were really crappy. > I don;'t know if the problem was the monitor or the video card > (insuffiicent bandwidth in the RAMDAC or output stage?) or what (it > wasn't my machine, I didn't have a chance to invetigate), but it > certainly can happen. The digitally-interfaced ones don't need a RAMDAC; they won't have this problem. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Mar 21 18:21:23 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:21:23 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA6A729.6090208@philpem.me.uk> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <4BA6817A.5010605@mail.msu.edu> <4BA6A729.6090208@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: On Mar 21, 2010, at 7:09 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote: >> > I don't know what Solaris 10's hardware support looks like >> these days on x86 machines, > > From what I've heard and been told, it's pretty dire. Frankly if I > was told to set up a server without using Linux, I'd probably go > with one of the BSDs... Nah, you've been told wrong. It runs on pretty much anything nowadays. It used to need very specific hardware, but that hasn't been the case for years. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From brad at heeltoe.com Sun Mar 21 18:55:01 2010 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:55:01 -0400 Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM (morphed in to a v8 triumph :-) In-Reply-To: <4BA532AD.4060508@virgin.net> (sfid-20100321_153845_407184_61414A40) References: <4BA532AD.4060508@virgin.net> (sfid-20100321_153845_407184_61414A40) Message-ID: <4BA6B1D5.6040808@heeltoe.com> Nigel Bailey wrote: > I don't know where you are tony, but I have the right pod on my old > stag to do 80/8749s I'm in luton. the first thing I thought of when I read this was a Triumph Stag :-) but I couldn't figure out where the pod was :-) horrible machines, but I'll never forget my yellow GT-6. -brad From spectre at floodgap.com Sun Mar 21 19:44:07 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 17:44:07 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: from Tony Duell at "Mar 21, 10 07:33:16 pm" Message-ID: <201003220044.o2M0i74i014832@floodgap.com> > > Honestly, while I can see the argument about color CRTs, I've never had > > a problem with the crispness of my LCD displays (at least when driven > > I have used PCs with LCD (I assume) montiors where the image was > noticeably unsharp. If the LCD was not at its native resolution, the scaler comes into play, which can be noticibly bad on low-quality monitors. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- BOND THEME NOW PLAYING: "Diamonds Are Forever" ----------------------------- From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to Sun Mar 21 20:27:33 2010 From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 20:27:33 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BA6C785.5010905@compsys.to> >Tony Duell wrote: >>With the fastest CPUs being used today, that is becoming increasingly MUCH >>more difficult. Tony, is that what you are concerned about as well, how the >>logic analysers are able to keep up? >> >That is certainly a problem (it's one reason I don't have a fast >computer, I can't afford a fast enough logic analyser to maintain it), >but it's not the problem I was thinking of here. > >I was thinking for farily traditional microcontrollers executing perhaps >20 million instructions per second at most. That is a rate that most >logic analysers can keep up with. But the problem is that if the >processor and program memory are on the same chip, there is no way of >conencting the analyser to the address and data buses so it can see >what's going on. > Thank you for the response. Over the years, I can't remember using a logic analyser more than two or perhaps three times. Since I usually work on projects by myself, I would not have had access to one. The last time, the fellow in charge of the project was not able to program, was was a whizz at electronics and could connect the logic analyser faster than I could see what he was doing. In addition, over 90% of my work for the past 20 years has been on the PDP-11 which has mostly adequate tools to debug the code, especially now with the Ersatz-11 emulator which adds a very low level of breakpoints which are able to operate even to debug the very first instruction during a boot far in advance of any debug program being set up. Of course, the hardware ODT debug could often help there as well, but not as conveniently. As for your last point, your observation that when instructions and data reside in cache, a logic analyser is not going to be very useful is an aspect I had not ever thought about as a potential problem. INTERESTING!! Jerome Fine From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Mar 21 21:30:50 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 22:30:50 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <201003220044.o2M0i74i014832@floodgap.com> References: <201003220044.o2M0i74i014832@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <66382620-EFA1-4A20-A08A-3C093BED2572@neurotica.com> On Mar 21, 2010, at 8:44 PM, Cameron Kaiser wrote: >>> Honestly, while I can see the argument about color CRTs, I've >>> never had >>> a problem with the crispness of my LCD displays (at least when >>> driven >> >> I have used PCs with LCD (I assume) montiors where the image was >> noticeably unsharp. > > If the LCD was not at its native resolution, the scaler comes into > play, > which can be noticibly bad on low-quality monitors. Yes, that really does make a mess of things. Even worse, it seems that some displays' scalers are better than others. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mjkerpan at kerpan.com Mon Mar 22 07:17:55 2010 From: mjkerpan at kerpan.com (Michael Kerpan) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 08:17:55 -0400 Subject: Whatever happened to the DG software archive... Message-ID: <8dd2d95c1003220517m19db0618led3bc7e053a4c445@mail.gmail.com> ... that was announced by Bruce Ray back in December. The original posting promised details in a few weeks but AFAIK such details never can forward. Did something happen to cancel the deal at the last second or are things just taking longer than originally thought. Mike From ray at arachelian.com Mon Mar 22 10:26:36 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 11:26:36 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <4BA6817A.5010605@mail.msu.edu> <4BA6A729.6090208@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4BA78C2C.7060409@arachelian.com> Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 21, 2010, at 7:09 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote: >>> > I don't know what Solaris 10's hardware support looks like >>> these days on x86 machines, >> >> From what I've heard and been told, it's pretty dire. Frankly if I >> was told to set up a server without using Linux, I'd probably go with >> one of the BSDs... > > Nah, you've been told wrong. It runs on pretty much anything > nowadays. It used to need very specific hardware, but that hasn't > been the case for years. > > Official Solaris 10 x86 seems to be hard to get fully working on hardware - On and off, I've been looking at Newegg and copying and pasting the motherboard models into the bigadmin HW compat webpage and been getting very few hits. Maybe the hw compat list hasn't been updated, I don't know... OTOH, I've been hearing loads of people say OpenSolaris usually works on far more systems. I'd like to get real Sol 10, but at some point I'll likely give up and go with Open. That said, if you've got a specific board recommendation that I can get off newegg that's known to work - something I can stuff upto 4GB of RAM and has loads of SATA plugs, gig-ethernet (single is fine), onboard video (meaning I'm not interested in wasting a slot on a video card I'll almost never use), and a few PCI slots (for firewire), I'm all ears. :-D Since I'd be going with ZFS, I wouldn't want hw raid, I'd rather let ZFS do the scrubs itself and not have the RAID controller mask failures from it. From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 22 11:03:15 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 12:03:15 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA78C2C.7060409@arachelian.com> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <4BA6817A.5010605@mail.msu.edu> <4BA6A729.6090208@philpem.me.uk> <4BA78C2C.7060409@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <994BA636-CC7C-401A-88D4-92DC5D81683A@neurotica.com> On Mar 22, 2010, at 11:26 AM, Ray Arachelian wrote: >>>>> I don't know what Solaris 10's hardware support looks like >>>> these days on x86 machines, >>> >>> From what I've heard and been told, it's pretty dire. Frankly if I >>> was told to set up a server without using Linux, I'd probably go >>> with >>> one of the BSDs... >> >> Nah, you've been told wrong. It runs on pretty much anything >> nowadays. It used to need very specific hardware, but that hasn't >> been the case for years. > > Official Solaris 10 x86 seems to be hard to get fully working on > hardware - On and off, I've been looking at Newegg and copying and > pasting the motherboard models into the bigadmin HW compat webpage and > been getting very few hits. Maybe the hw compat list hasn't been > updated, I don't know... Well your mistake there is looking at the HCL. ;) I've run it on several random systems containing random hardware and it nearly always Just Works. Note that I generally avoid "whiz-bang" proprietary stuff like monster gamer graphics cards, sixteen- gazillion-port SATA RAID controllers (I have a SAN here), etc etc that usually need funky binary-only drivers from the manufacturer. For standard hardware everything just seems to work, and is rarely specifically listed in the HCL. HCLs are almost always extremely conservative. Especially for "official" Solaris, they'll only list stuff that has been BEATEN TO DEATH in their testbed networks. As you well know, this isn't Windows...Solaris goes through an unbelievable amount of prerelease testing. Far, far more stuff than is listed in the HCL runs just fine. > OTOH, I've been hearing loads of people say > OpenSolaris usually works on far more systems. I'd like to get > real Sol > 10, but at some point I'll likely give up and go with Open. I run "official" solaris exclusively, but will probably explore OpenSolaris in a virtual machine at some point. With the exception of VMs, though, I'm exclusively UltraSPARC-based here. (well except for a couple of Macs) It's true that OpenSolaris supports much more stuff than "official" Solaris does. > That said, if you've got a specific board recommendation that I can > get > off newegg that's known to work - something I can stuff upto 4GB of > RAM > and has loads of SATA plugs, gig-ethernet (single is fine), onboard > video (meaning I'm not interested in wasting a slot on a video card > I'll > almost never use), and a few PCI slots (for firewire), I'm all ears. > :-D Since I'd be going with ZFS, I wouldn't want hw raid, I'd rather > let ZFS do the scrubs itself and not have the RAID controller mask > failures from it. No I'm sorry I don't have a recommendation; I don't really do PC stuff that much. I can tell you, though, that the machine I most recently installed Solaris x86 on was an HP DL140 G2. Everything in it worked perfectly. Also, I'm currently running it at several customer installations under VMware ESXi (both 3.5 and 4.0), and under VMware Server. Oh, and...do yourself a favor, hit eBay for hardware and get high- end stuff. I'll take industrial-grade stuff (even used...especially used actually, as it usually comes with useful hardware installed) over cheap consumer garbage any time. (the aforementioned DL140 G2 cost me about $75...that's lowest-end industrial, but built quite well nonetheless) -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 22 13:43:36 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:43:36 -0400 Subject: OT:(rare systems) Re: Taking offers on PDP-8 (straight-8) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3B1D3590-6B1C-427E-9426-2885D26A37F3@neurotica.com> On Mar 8, 2010, at 3:19 PM, Robert Borsuk wrote: >> PERQ AGW3300 (aka PERQ 3a), PERQ 2T4 and AMT DAP 610 > > Sign me up. I have a AMT DAP 610 with all the manuals, software > and the sun workstations that went with it. I drool uncontrollably. Is it operational? Have you run it? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 22 13:50:49 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:50:49 -0400 Subject: chemistry simulator on Apple ][? Message-ID: <8BC48D41-4536-43A2-B339-0D3DC0AE9E2D@neurotica.com> A local friend is looking for an old chemistry simulator program for the Apple ][. Here's his description: > I'm trying to find a "chemistry simulator" program that I used to play > with on an Apple II way back in the day. I don't remember the name of > it, but I remember being able to build a decent "lab" out of parts and > pieces. I remember that the first lesson was an experiment to figure > out why the fertilizer ship in Texas City exploded after an onboard > fire. Does anyone know what this might've been called, or better yet, does anyone have a copy? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 22 13:19:52 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 18:19:52 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP 2671 Graphics ROM In-Reply-To: <535C65F1C49149569F53CDDC83C3AE68@xp1800> from "Rik Bos" at Mar 21, 10 10:46:08 pm Message-ID: > > > PSU is indeed the same, HP-IB board is the same 02670-60072 > > Rev.A ROM > > > (U15) 02670-80078, Processor (U2)8039, (U13) Empty socket. > > > > DO you mean U13 is empty? What about U14? Is there a 2K*8 RAM (2016, > > 6116) on this board at all? > > Yes U13 is empty, U14 are empty holes. > No RAM at all on the board, the dipswitch 2K is open too. > So I suppose I can place a 6116 in the U13 socket, and switch the 2K > dipswitch to closed, to have the advantage of a smal hp-ib buffer. > Should speed up data transfer a little.. The DIP switch you mention has nothing to do with the RAM. According to the seckematic it swtiches one of the address lines to the external ROM (U15), and I think you should leave it in the position it's set to. I have no idea if the HPIB interfac firmware will automatically recognise the external RAM. My printer has a single 2016 chip (strangely marked with an 02670-xxxxx number _and the 2016 number) in position U13. U14 is empty. > > Right. Sounds like I'd better have a go at buildign a device > > to read out 8049s... > > Would be nice.. I will see what I can do... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 22 13:27:12 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 18:27:12 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: from "Guy Sotomayor" at Mar 21, 10 03:13:53 pm Message-ID: > >> I typically use the PDFs for research/study (other than the source of = > =3D > >> work copies). I also am fortunate enough to have a 30" display with = > a =3D > >> 2560x1600 resolution. It's big enough and with enough resolution = > that I=20 > >=20 > > Fortunate, indeed. I don't know how much a 30" monitor would cose, and = > I=20 > > don't kno how much it would cost to keep it running for, say, 20 = > years,=20 > > but I am sure of one thing -- it's more than I could afford... > > Yea it was expensive (the whole machine it's connected to was = > frighteningly expensive...I've purchased new cars that cost considerably = I see... So it's not exactly an option for most of us... > less...but that's another story). Hopefully it'll last a while. It's = > an LCD so the thing that's most likely to fail are the cold cathode = > florescent tubes used for the backlight. I suspect that the LED = > versions of these displays will last forever assuming the panel doesn't = > get damaged physically. I am not so sure... I've had the seals on LCD displays fail (the LCD then seeps out, the display turns black from the corners/edges). The LCD material itself can degrade with time too. I assume modern panels are better than the displays of 20 or 30 years ago, but still... Eelctronic components also fail as we all know. Capacitors are going to fail (which is probably not a big problem), so will ICs (which is). Yes, an LSI chip is more reliable than all the components it replaces but it's less reliable in my experience than a simpler chip. And a lot harder to obtain and fit. I am not sure what sort of service data you can get for these LCD monitors. I have the service manual for our LCD television. You module-swap the PSU board and the LCD panel. You repair the signal-processing panel to component level (for all it contains BGA-packaged devicea) -- but all you get is a schematic. No waveform data or test points. I am not looking forward to having to fix this thing. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 22 14:01:14 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 19:01:14 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA6C785.5010905@compsys.to> from "Jerome H. Fine" at Mar 21, 10 08:27:33 pm Message-ID: > Thank you for the response. Over the years, I can't remember using a > logic analyser > more than two or perhaps three times. Since I usually work on projects A logic analyser is actually more usually used for hardware debugging (provided that hardware is not all inside an FPGA or similar where you can't proble the signals [1]). A good analyser will let you find a timing problem very quickly -- provided you know how ot use it and interpret the results. In my younger days, I thoguh that the reason I had problems debugging digital hardware (both of my own desing and fixing commercial stuff) was that I didn't have a logic anlyaser. I felt that was a 'wonder machine' that would solve all my problems. I now realise that the main problem I has was lack of experience (and intellegence), and that quite simple test gear will find most poblems. I now have several logic analysers, and while I do use them, and yes, they are sometimes essential for tracking down the fault, they are not a replacement for a brain :-) [1] It is sometimes claimed you can bring out internal signals in the FPGA to spare pins on the device and conenct a logic analyser to them. The problem is that any change to the FPGA configuration is likely to internally re-route sginals which will significantlu alter the timing. So if your logic design is poor, you will find glitches come and go ans you change the signals you're looking at. And if oyur logic design is good, you don;'t have problems anyway. This is one reason why for one-off designes I am much happier wiring up a few dozen TTL packages than using programmable devices. It's quicker to build and debug. > by myself, > I would not have had access to one. The last time, the fellow in charge > of the project > was not able to program, was was a whizz at electronics and could > connect the logic > analyser faster than I could see what he was doing. > > In addition, over 90% of my work for the past 20 years has been on the > PDP-11 > which has mostly adequate tools to debug the code, especially now with the The time I use a logic analyaser on the PDP11 (or any other minicomputer) is to track down hardware fualts in the CPU to gate level. Single-stepping the microocde, while very useful, doesn't pick up problems when a gate is 'going slow'. Similarly my technique for debugging an HP9810/9820/9030 'calculator' is to connect a logic analyser to the test conenctor on the CPU control PCB and trace the microcode. Armed witht he microcode source listing (it's the same for all the machines), I can then see just what the CPU thinks it's doing and see (a) if that's sensible and (b) if it's actually doing it. [...] > As for your last point, your observation that when instructions and data > reside > in cache, a logic analyser is not going to be very useful is an aspect I > had not > ever thought about as a potential problem. INTERESTING!! There are 2 reelated problems. With a modern-ish microprocessor (external program store, but things like instruction pipelines, prefetch buffers, etc), you can't know what the CPU is actually doing at any point. If you have an internal cache, it is of course even worse. The other problem is that with microcontrollers, even if it's a simple, old-fashioned, CPU sturctur, the entire program memory is on the same chip as the CPU itself. You simply don't have access to the program store address and data buses. So you can't know what the CPU is actually trying to execute, or even what program locations it's read. I do seriously wonder about the real value of such chips used in control systems. I'd rahter have something simpler that I can show is working correctly. It seems to me that a lot of the time the extra power of these modern microcontrollers doesn't at anything useful to the final product. -tony From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 22 14:27:31 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 15:27:31 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mar 22, 2010, at 3:01 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > I do seriously wonder about the real value of such chips used in > control > systems. I'd rahter have something simpler that I can show is working > correctly. It seems to me that a lot of the time the extra power of > these > modern microcontrollers doesn't at anything useful to the final > product. Well, the whole world runs on them. Things seem to be going ok. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From alexeyt at freeshell.org Mon Mar 22 14:52:36 2010 From: alexeyt at freeshell.org (Alexey Toptygin) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 19:52:36 +0000 (UTC) Subject: Async logic In-Reply-To: <4BA64CC5.1030005@heeltoe.com> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> <4B99458B.6000409@philpem.me.uk> (sfid-20100311_145056_600573_5F1B2CDD) <4BA4F363.8050201@verizon.net> (sfid-20100320_121316_167231_4007BDBF) <4BA64CC5.1030005@heeltoe.com> Message-ID: On Sun, 21 Mar 2010, Brad Parker wrote: > Now I will make one caveat. A lot of the early DEC designs used pulse > or asynchronous logic. I would avoid that. I would stick with > completely synchronous design. So, if you are reading an old book and > it talks about async design, I'd skip that part. Certainly anything > from Mick & Brick on is fully synchronous. What's wrong with pulse or async logic designs? I personally find them fascinating, but I've never gotten to play with an implementation of one... Are there problems with designing like this that made people switch to sync designs? Anyone know of any good books on non-synchronous logic design? Alexey From andreww591 at gmail.com Mon Mar 22 15:33:00 2010 From: andreww591 at gmail.com (Andrew Warkentin) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:33:00 -0600 Subject: Whatever happened to the DG software archive... In-Reply-To: <8dd2d95c1003220517m19db0618led3bc7e053a4c445@mail.gmail.com> References: <8dd2d95c1003220517m19db0618led3bc7e053a4c445@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BA7D3FC.9070903@gmail.com> Michael Kerpan wrote: > ... that was announced by Bruce Ray back in December. The original > posting promised details in a few weeks but AFAIK such details never > can forward. Did something happen to cancel the deal at the last > second or are things just taking longer than originally thought. > > Mike > I was wondering the same thing. I asked Bruce Ray about it a few days ago, but I haven't heard back from him. I'm especially interested in operating systems other than RDOS (for which I already have images). If anybody has any images, please make them available for download (provided that the license permits anybody to redistribute DG software images and isn't specific to Wild Hare Computers). Another thing that I was wondering about was the HP-CHM agreement that was announced a few years ago on this list. I know that there ware images of RTE-6/VM posted on Bitsavers, but were there supposed to be images of other HP 21xx/1000 software released somewhere? From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Mar 22 15:54:01 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 16:54:01 -0400 Subject: Whatever happened to the DG software archive... In-Reply-To: <4BA7D3FC.9070903@gmail.com> References: <8dd2d95c1003220517m19db0618led3bc7e053a4c445@mail.gmail.com> <4BA7D3FC.9070903@gmail.com> Message-ID: > I was wondering the same thing. I asked Bruce Ray about it a few days ago, > but I haven't heard back from him. Bruce can get very busy. The best answer is: Just be patient. Nothing has gone wrong. -- Will From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 22 16:00:43 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:00:43 -0700 Subject: Async logic In-Reply-To: References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net>, <4BA64CC5.1030005@heeltoe.com>, Message-ID: <4BA7780B.25573.1014B6E@cclist.sydex.com> On 22 Mar 2010 at 19:52, Alexey Toptygin wrote: > What's wrong with pulse or async logic designs? I personally find them > fascinating, but I've never gotten to play with an implementation of > one... Are there problems with designing like this that made people > switch to sync designs? Anyone know of any good books on > non-synchronous logic design? Not off the top of my head, but I seem to recall that the Philco TRANSAC System 2000 of a half-century ago was implemented asynchronously. There's a few documents on the 212 CPU on bitsavers. --Chuck From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Mon Mar 22 16:07:05 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:07:05 -0700 Subject: Async logic References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> <4B99458B.6000409@philpem.me.uk> (sfid-20100311_145056_600573_5F1B2CDD) <4BA4F363.8050201@verizon.net> (sfid-20100320_121316_167231_4007BDBF) <4BA64CC5.1030005@heeltoe.com> Message-ID: <4BA7DBFA.8BE5CCD@cs.ubc.ca> Alexey Toptygin wrote: > > On Sun, 21 Mar 2010, Brad Parker wrote: > > > Now I will make one caveat. A lot of the early DEC designs used pulse > > or asynchronous logic. I would avoid that. I would stick with > > completely synchronous design. So, if you are reading an old book and > > it talks about async design, I'd skip that part. Certainly anything > > from Mick & Brick on is fully synchronous. > > What's wrong with pulse or async logic designs? I personally find them > fascinating, but I've never gotten to play with an implementation of > one... Are there problems with designing like this that made people switch > to sync designs? Anyone know of any good books on non-synchronous logic > design? I think the first thing needed is a good definition of async vs sync design. "Async design" seems to be something of a catch-all category that includes everything that isn't purely synchronous. The Von-Neumann IAS machine design is sometimes described as being async with no definitive clock rate, but I've never seen a description of what that means in terms of that actual design. The problem with async designs, at last by some definition, is the different delays through combinatorial logic and staggered clocking of state-holding elements (flip-flops) can result in glitches in subsequent signals derived from that logic. If those derived signals are then used to clock other elements, extraneous clocking can occur. The designer has to keep on top of this - be constantly aware of where it may occur in the system - and account for it, sometimes by tailoring the logic with delay elements to 'pass over' (ignore) the glitches (see below). Glitches can/do occur in synchronous systems as well, but there is one global rule for accounting for them: clock everything at the same time (synchronously), and wait a fixed period until everything settles before clocking again. I dealt with a reasonably complex async-design logic system from the 60's in reverse-engineering and repairing a Casio AL-1000 calculator: http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~hilpert/eec/misc/CasioAL1000Tech/index.html and in particular: http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~hilpert/eec/misc/CasioAL1000Tech/electronics.html#edgepulse What I call 'edge-pulse gates' - a sort of monostable - are injected into the logic at appropriate places to soak up the glitches (one would have to look at the schematic to see where/how they are actually used). From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Mon Mar 22 15:54:01 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 20:54:01 -0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca><017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <29C72050-2941-4ADA-A553-71B1F21CCEED@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <00bb01caca0d$87ea3820$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Dave McGuire" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Saturday, March 20, 2010 6:14 PM Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > On Mar 20, 2010, at 12:46 PM, Andrew Burton wrote: > > > > Leaving a computer running 24/7 may not harm the hardware as much, > > but it > > harms the evironment and your electricity bill. > > That's not relevant here; I run servers that are used by people in > other places. My power bill is consistently about $400-500/mo, and > that's a great deal of consolidation and optimization. Some may > whine, but that's still a lot cheaper than two racks' worth of colo > space, and I can work on things without getting dressed and leaving > the house. > > So in the face of that, leaving my desktop machine on doesn't make > any real difference. Further, leaving it on (as I mentioned earlier) > means I can get to it from other places, which I frequently need to do. > Ahh, in that case I see why you leave it on :) > > We always shut our computers > > down at work at the end of the day, or when they are finished with. > > I never > > leave my laptop on all the time, since I only use it a few hours > > each day. I > > certainly disconnect from the internet when I don't need website, > > Gopher or > > BBS access. Less chance of a virus infecting my laptop then. > > I run UNIX; that addresses the virus problem. ;) > Hehe :) Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Mon Mar 22 17:17:27 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 22:17:27 -0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ray Arachelian" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Sunday, March 21, 2010 4:05 PM Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > Andrew Burton wrote: > > Leaving a computer running 24/7 may not harm the hardware as much, but it > > harms the evironment and your electricity bill. We always shut our computers > > down at work at the end of the day, or when they are finished with. I never > > leave my laptop on all the time, since I only use it a few hours each day. I > > certainly disconnect from the internet when I don't need website, Gopher or > > BBS access. > Surely you've heard of wake-on-LAN, and sleep/standby or even > suspend/hibernate. Surely you've heard of power management, you know, > spin down disks whenever possible, shut down the display after 10 > minutes, sleep after 30 minutes, that sort of thing? I hear these > things are available even for virus infectable and registry laden > operating systems. These are generally considered solved problems at > this point. Some good points, but: - No LAN here - Never use sleep/standby, as when I'm finished with my laptop I usually end up playing videogames, with the games console being powered from the socket that the laptop plug was occupying. - I let the display go to screen saver, but never use sleep. See previous point. > > > Less chance of a virus infecting my laptop then. > > > Running an infectable operating system is a different problem, but one > that has a very easy solution. :-) > :) > > My laptop currently takes 10 minutes to boot (including everything loading > > after logging in). > Mine takes less than 2 seconds to wake from sleep, and when it comes > back online, everything is where I left it, ready to go, I don't have to > relaunch any apps. Most of the time my ssh sessions are still there > and connected. If not, RSA keys and screen make short work of that issue. > On the few occasions it goes to sleep mode (usually just as the internal battery becomes critically low), mine also takes 2 seconds to wake up (plus a few extra to log back in). > Shutting down is far too inconvenient. If you add up all the time it > takes to shut down, restart, relaunch everything every day, you'll find > you're giving a significant chunk of your life in service to a machine > which should be serving you instead. Life's too short to waste on such > acrobatics. Old, or new, use the technology such that it works in your > favor, not against it. > Who says I waste time whilst booting up or shutting down? I'm usually watching TV when I switch it on, and usually going to bed when I shut it down - I trundle downstairs for a drink and by the time I return it has shut down :) > > I do need to do a registry cleanout though[1], which is > > lucky that I have a week off in April. Plenty of time to get all the > > 'little' jobs done :) > > > Again, if running an OS that has a registry is problematic, that problem > has a very easy solution. :) > Remove the registry?!! :) Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From andreww591 at gmail.com Mon Mar 22 19:04:26 2010 From: andreww591 at gmail.com (Andrew Warkentin) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 18:04:26 -0600 Subject: Wanted: Graphics card and drive sled for RS/6000 7046-B50 Message-ID: <4BA8058A.3070202@gmail.com> I recently bought an RS/6000 7046-B50. It didn't have a graphics card installed (I can use it over a serial console, but I would prefer to be able to use a graphical console). It is also missing the drive sleds. Does anybody have a graphics card or drive sled that would work with it? From pete at dunnington.plus.com Mon Mar 22 19:37:24 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 00:37:24 +0000 Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: References: <4AD302B1.6070805@rs432.net> <014101ca4b25$b92a22e0$1e04a8c0@ad.mediawebbsupport.se> Message-ID: <4BA80D44.4040708@dunnington.plus.com> On 22/03/2010 19:18, Alex Taylor wrote: > The idea was that reformatting a 1.44MB HD disk in a DD drive will > leave traces of the original formatting behind (as they're always > preformatted for DOS/Windows), causing the unreliability. Using a bulk > eraser is meant to eliminate this problem, as it will turn them into > completely blank disks that can be formatted in a DD drive more > reliably. That won't really matter. When you format a disk you write bit patterns all over it: in the headers, in the data sectors, and even in much of the gaps between them (sync bytes and clock patterns used as markers). Thus there's something there even when you write the first real data, and of course it never lines up exactly, bit for bit. Therefore you still have the problem of interference from the previous "data" even if it's just the dummy data used to fill a "blank" sector, and the sync bytes and markers in the preamble to it. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From cisin at xenosoft.com Mon Mar 22 19:54:08 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 17:54:08 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: <4BA80D44.4040708@dunnington.plus.com> References: <4AD302B1.6070805@rs432.net> <014101ca4b25$b92a22e0$1e04a8c0@ad.mediawebbsupport.se> <4BA80D44.4040708@dunnington.plus.com> Message-ID: <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> On 22/03/2010 19:18, Alex Taylor wrote: > The idea was that reformatting a 1.44MB HD disk in a DD drive will > leave traces of the original formatting behind (as they're always > preformatted for DOS/Windows), causing the unreliability. Using a bulk > eraser is meant to eliminate this problem, as it will turn them into > completely blank disks that can be formatted in a DD drive more > reliably. In addition to all that, . . . The coercivity (sorta like magnetic sensitivity) is WRONG. "720K" diskettes are 600 Oersted. "1.4M" diskettes are about 750 Oersted. It IS close (unlike 360K (300 Oersted) v 1.2M (600 Oersted)), and it WILL work (unlike 360K v 1.2M), but it will NOT be as reliable as using the correct diskette. From afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 22 20:10:17 2010 From: afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk (Phill Harvey-Smith) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 01:10:17 +0000 Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> References: <4AD302B1.6070805@rs432.net> <014101ca4b25$b92a22e0$1e04a8c0@ad.mediawebbsupport.se> <4BA80D44.4040708@dunnington.plus.com> <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA814F9.5040407@aurigae.demon.co.uk> Fred Cisin wrote: > In addition to all that, . . . > The coercivity (sorta like magnetic sensitivity) is WRONG. > "720K" diskettes are 600 Oersted. > "1.4M" diskettes are about 750 Oersted. > > It IS close (unlike 360K (300 Oersted) v 1.2M (600 Oersted)), and it WILL > work (unlike 360K v 1.2M), but it will NOT be as reliable as using the > correct diskette. It would need to be for those punchout devices that where sold back in the early 90s to 'convert' 720K disks to 1.44MB disks by punching the detect hole out. Mind in my previous job I had to take a drill to a 720K disk that a studenet had formatted as a 1.44MB disk on his Archemedes, oddly the PC could not read it. Once the hole was drilled it worked fine. Was this just one model of Archemedes that had this 'feature' or was it Acorn deciding that they could ignore the standard ? Cheers, Phill. -- Phill Harvey-Smith, Programmer, Hardware hacker, and general eccentric ! "You can twist perceptions, but reality won't budge" -- Rush. From trixter at oldskool.org Mon Mar 22 20:15:45 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 20:15:45 -0500 Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: <4BA814F9.5040407@aurigae.demon.co.uk> References: <4AD302B1.6070805@rs432.net> <014101ca4b25$b92a22e0$1e04a8c0@ad.mediawebbsupport.se> <4BA80D44.4040708@dunnington.plus.com> <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> <4BA814F9.5040407@aurigae.demon.co.uk> Message-ID: <4BA81641.2040907@oldskool.org> On 3/22/2010 8:10 PM, Phill Harvey-Smith wrote: > It would need to be for those punchout devices that where sold back in > the early 90s to 'convert' 720K disks to 1.44MB disks by punching the > detect hole out. I have one sitting right here as a testament to digital flim-flam men. It's solid steel. I remember the advertising: "We formatted, read, and wrote this disk 30 DAYS IN A ROW without a single error!" Yes, well, try to read that disk six months from now and you'll find the contents completely faded. > Was this just one model of Archemedes that had this 'feature' or was it > Acorn deciding that they could ignore the standard ? All PS/2 Model 30-286 machines had this quirk too (completely ignored the detect hole and always assumed 1.44MB media). I could never figure out why I couldn't read my friend's 720K disks until I burned a hole into it using a soldering iron on a hunch. I continued that practice into college because I was a broke college student. After losing part of an assignment due to bit fade, I started taping the holes back up... -- 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 Mon Mar 22 20:21:33 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 18:21:33 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: <4BA814F9.5040407@aurigae.demon.co.uk> References: <4AD302B1.6070805@rs432.net> <014101ca4b25$b92a22e0$1e04a8c0@ad.mediawebbsupport.se> <4BA80D44.4040708@dunnington.plus.com> <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> <4BA814F9.5040407@aurigae.demon.co.uk> Message-ID: <20100322182006.Q220@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Phill Harvey-Smith wrote: > Mind in my previous job I had to take a drill to a 720K disk that a > studenet had formatted as a 1.44MB disk on his Archemedes, oddly the PC > could not read it. Once the hole was drilled it worked fine. > Was this just one model of Archemedes that had this 'feature' or was it > Acorn deciding that they could ignore the standard ? It wasn't ONLY Acorn. Most of the early PS/2 3.5" drives had no media sensor. From cisin at xenosoft.com Mon Mar 22 20:26:43 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 18:26:43 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: <4BA81641.2040907@oldskool.org> References: <4AD302B1.6070805@rs432.net> <014101ca4b25$b92a22e0$1e04a8c0@ad.mediawebbsupport.se> <4BA80D44.4040708@dunnington.plus.com> <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> <4BA814F9.5040407@aurigae.demon.co.uk> <4BA81641.2040907@oldskool.org> Message-ID: <20100322182337.Q220@shell.lmi.net> > > It would need to be for those punchout devices that where sold back in > > the early 90s to 'convert' 720K disks to 1.44MB disks by punching the > > detect hole out. On Mon, 22 Mar 2010, Jim Leonard wrote: > I have one sitting right here as a testament to digital flim-flam men. > It's solid steel. I remember the advertising: "We formatted, read, and > wrote this disk 30 DAYS IN A ROW without a single error!" Yes, well, > try to read that disk six months from now and you'll find the contents > completely faded. One of them had an advertisement where they stated that they had carefully compared the two types of dikettes with a MICROMETER, and determined that they were the same. From afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 22 21:01:55 2010 From: afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk (Phill Harvey-Smith) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 02:01:55 +0000 Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: <20100322182337.Q220@shell.lmi.net> References: <4AD302B1.6070805@rs432.net> <014101ca4b25$b92a22e0$1e04a8c0@ad.mediawebbsupport.se> <4BA80D44.4040708@dunnington.plus.com> <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> <4BA814F9.5040407@aurigae.demon.co.uk> <4BA81641.2040907@oldskool.org> <20100322182337.Q220@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA82113.8070600@aurigae.demon.co.uk> Fred Cisin wrote: > One of them had an advertisement where they stated that they had carefully > compared the two types of dikettes with a MICROMETER, and determined that > they were the same. It's rather Ironic really that we started this discussion because we wanted to do the reverse of what these punches did...... 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 Mon Mar 22 21:05:49 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 19:05:49 -0700 Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> References: , <4BA80D44.4040708@dunnington.plus.com>, <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA7BF8D.27376.218A113@cclist.sydex.com> On 22 Mar 2010 at 17:54, Fred Cisin wrote: > In addition to all that, . . . > The coercivity (sorta like magnetic sensitivity) is WRONG. > "720K" diskettes are 600 Oersted. > "1.4M" diskettes are about 750 Oersted. > > It IS close (unlike 360K (300 Oersted) v 1.2M (600 Oersted)), and it > WILL work (unlike 360K v 1.2M), but it will NOT be as reliable as > using the correct diskette. It's much more than that. Coating thickness (DS2D uses a thicker coating than DSHD). Particle size (DSHD uses a smaller particle). Loading (DS2D loads the binder more heavily). If you've got one of each type, slide the shutter over and look at a bright light through the cookie. Usually, you can see quite clearly through DSHD media, but DS2D is almost always opaque. Gotta be something to that... I recall that some were even formatting DS2D media as DSED in the bad old PS/2 days. Numerous claims of it working--but for only a short time. DSED uses a barium ferrite formulation rather than an iron oxide. --Chuck From IanK at vulcan.com Mon Mar 22 21:45:13 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 19:45:13 -0700 Subject: Whatever happened to the DG software archive... In-Reply-To: References: <8dd2d95c1003220517m19db0618led3bc7e053a4c445@mail.gmail.com> <4BA7D3FC.9070903@gmail.com>, Message-ID: Will, you beat me to it. :-) I've had several conversations with Bruce over the years, and he keeps quite busy with is *paying* job. He's very conscientious and will follow through, but hey, everyone's gotta eat.... -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of William Donzelli [wdonzelli at gmail.com] Sent: Monday, March 22, 2010 1:54 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Whatever happened to the DG software archive... > I was wondering the same thing. I asked Bruce Ray about it a few days ago, > but I haven't heard back from him. Bruce can get very busy. The best answer is: Just be patient. Nothing has gone wrong. -- Will From healyzh at aracnet.com Mon Mar 22 21:57:09 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 19:57:09 -0700 Subject: TSX+ ??? (was: Whatever happened to the DG software archive...) In-Reply-To: <4BA7D3FC.9070903@gmail.com> References: <8dd2d95c1003220517m19db0618led3bc7e053a4c445@mail.gmail.com> <4BA7D3FC.9070903@gmail.com> Message-ID: At 2:33 PM -0600 3/22/10, Andrew Warkentin wrote: >I was wondering the same thing. I asked Bruce Ray about it a few >days ago, but I haven't heard back from him. I'm especially >interested in operating systems other than RDOS (for which I already >have images). If anybody has any images, please make them available >for download (provided that the license permits anybody to >redistribute DG software images and isn't specific to Wild Hare >Computers). > >Another thing that I was wondering about was the HP-CHM agreement >that was announced a few years ago on this list. I know that there >ware images of RTE-6/VM posted on Bitsavers, but were there supposed >to be images of other HP 21xx/1000 software released somewhere? I've another one, what ever happened to the TSX+ that was announced a few years ago? Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 unibus at gmail.com Mon Mar 22 22:19:41 2010 From: unibus at gmail.com (Unibus) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 14:19:41 +1100 Subject: eBay Oz : Collection of DEC Unibus modules including custom wire-wrap Message-ID: > > Message: 6 > Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:12:10 +1100 > From: Nigel Williams > Subject: eBay Oz : Collection of DEC Unibus modules including custom > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > All sorts of interesting items: TU-60, CM-11, M792 etc > > http://shop.ebay.com.au/pdp11.caps11/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1 > > not connected with seller, however I did purchase fanfold paper-tape from > this eBayer. > I'm the seller so blame me.... blatant plug follows :-) I have to clear out my shed so I'll be dumping on eBay.com.au various bits and pieces. Predominantly it will be DEC UNIBUS modules, papertape, CAPS-11 operating system, plus technical documentation. Stuff is coming out in random order. E.g. some of the -K series laboratory modules have been listed but I've only just found the panels and some of the cables. Really only of interest to Australians are the heavy/bulky/delicate items like the PDP-11 system with the LPS-11 / TU60, or FABRI-TEK Model 11 Add-On Memory System, etc., that are being listed as local pickup. There will some Heathkit (H10 papertape readers/punches and a 3400A microcomputer trainer) plus should be some HP GPIB gear. The Tektronix gear has already gone. I do not have any CM-11 card readers, just some of the UNIBUS interface modules. Regards, Garry From jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de Tue Mar 23 03:00:51 2010 From: jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de (Jochen Kunz) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 09:00:51 +0100 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: <4BA6C785.5010905@compsys.to> Message-ID: <20100323090051.6c5aea59.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> On Mon, 22 Mar 2010 19:01:14 +0000 (GMT) ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote: > There are 2 reelated problems. With a modern-ish microprocessor (external > program store, but things like instruction pipelines, prefetch buffers, > etc), you can't know what the CPU is actually doing at any point. If you > have an internal cache, it is of course even worse. Well. If you need more compute power then a 8085 you have to apply advanced technics such as caches and superscalar CPUs. Even if you can get away with a small 8 bit controller you want a high integrated single chip solution. At least I do. A single Atmel AVR with ISP programmer is so much more comfortable to use, cheaper and faster to deploy then a whole board filled with CPU, RAM, ROM, IO, ... A single chip solution will work out of the box. A discrete CPU, RAM, ROM, IO, ... solution needs lots of debuging in itself before I can start to address the real problem. > The other problem is that with microcontrollers, even if it's a simple, > old-fashioned, CPU sturctur, the entire program memory is on the same > chip as the CPU itself. You simply don't have access to the program store > address and data buses. So you can't know what the CPU is actually trying > to execute, or even what program locations it's read. > > I do seriously wonder about the real value of such chips used in control > systems. I'd rahter have something simpler that I can show is working > correctly. It seems to me that a lot of the time the extra power of these > modern microcontrollers doesn't at anything useful to the final product. Tony, I am afraid you have no clue what modern microcontrolers do. E.g. the controler in my washing machine can detect how much dirty laundry is in the machine. It does this by measuring the amount of soaked up water. So the machine uses only as much water as is needed. I.e. if the machine isn't loaded to the max. it will use less water and thus less energy for heating and less detregent. An other example. Modern car engine management systems do a closed loop simulation of the engine they control. (State observer a la Luenberger or Kalman filter.) This way the management system can estimate e.g. themperatures in various parts of the engine. This is needed to optimize ignition and fuel injection timing, ... and thus minimize fuel consumtion. A modern Disel common rail injection is a highly sophisticated mechatronical system. Not to talk about anti-lock brake system... This is somthing I definitely want as it saves my money and enhances safety. But you can't do this with a 8085. -- tsch??, Jochen Homepage: http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/ From chrise at pobox.com Mon Mar 22 21:39:51 2010 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 21:39:51 -0500 Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> References: <4AD302B1.6070805@rs432.net> <014101ca4b25$b92a22e0$1e04a8c0@ad.mediawebbsupport.se> <4BA80D44.4040708@dunnington.plus.com> <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20100323023951.GF6299@n0jcf.net> On Monday (03/22/2010 at 05:54PM -0700), Fred Cisin wrote: > On 22/03/2010 19:18, Alex Taylor wrote: > > The idea was that reformatting a 1.44MB HD disk in a DD drive will > > leave traces of the original formatting behind (as they're always > > preformatted for DOS/Windows), causing the unreliability. Using a bulk > > eraser is meant to eliminate this problem, as it will turn them into > > completely blank disks that can be formatted in a DD drive more > > reliably. > > In addition to all that, . . . > The coercivity (sorta like magnetic sensitivity) is WRONG. > "720K" diskettes are 600 Oersted. > "1.4M" diskettes are about 750 Oersted. > > It IS close (unlike 360K (300 Oersted) v 1.2M (600 Oersted)), and it WILL > work (unlike 360K v 1.2M), but it will NOT be as reliable as using the > correct diskette. So, does that mean that the 720K (600 Oersted) media requires a bigger signal (ie, more write current) than the 750 Oersted 1.44M or the other way around? It would seem that in one case you would be overdriving the media and in the other case you might be underdriving it. Which way is which? Chris -- Chris Elmquist From jws at jwsss.com Mon Mar 22 22:27:36 2010 From: jws at jwsss.com (jim s) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 20:27:36 -0700 Subject: Async logic In-Reply-To: References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> <4B99458B.6000409@philpem.me.uk> (sfid-20100311_145056_600573_5F1B2CDD) <4BA4F363.8050201@verizon.net> (sfid-20100320_121316_167231_4007BDBF) <4BA64CC5.1030005@heeltoe.com> Message-ID: <4BA83528.7020609@jwsss.com> Varian 520i and 620i's were both asynchronous. They could not execute things in time, and when a 520i emulation was implemented for the Microdata 1600, it found several OS bugs which had been covered over by busy loops that suddenly did not inject random times to fix the bugs (which should have been fixed properly with locks). Jim From mcl198 at frontiernet.net Mon Mar 22 23:00:05 2010 From: mcl198 at frontiernet.net (Patrick McLeod) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 21:00:05 -0700 Subject: mewel Message-ID: <000601caca3d$53e73e80$03fea8c0@HP21680137376> Hello, Does anybody have the source code and libarays for the old MEWEL windows interface? I have been looking for this so the source code for a Juki Pick and Place machine can be updated. If there is a fee for this, just let me know. Thanks, Patrick McLeod McLeod Instruments, Ltd. 928-535-6369 From julianskidmore at yahoo.com Tue Mar 23 06:09:22 2010 From: julianskidmore at yahoo.com (Julian Skidmore) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 04:09:22 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Async logic Message-ID: <333032.19816.qm@web111704.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Alexey Toptygin wrote: > What's wrong with pulse or async logic designs? I personally find them > fascinating, but I've never gotten to play with an implementation of > one... Are there problems with designing like this that made people switch > to sync designs? Anyone know of any good books on non-synchronous logic > design? Probably the best resources are the Amulet resources from Manchester University. http://intranet.cs.man.ac.uk/apt/async/ In the late 90s they experimented with Asynchronous ARM processors. The difficulty with asynchronous design is that it's far more prone to race hazards than synchronous design. Also, they found that even the simple handshaking protocol they used limits performance. Nevertheless, they do have some advantages, for example their EMF emmissions tend to be evenly spread across a broad spectrum. Incidently, modern synchronous design is far less synchronous than it used to be; high clock rates mean that CPUs are subdivided into differently clocked domains to avoid clock skew. -cheers from julz @p From lproven at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 07:44:57 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:44:57 +0000 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* Message-ID: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> Noting the discussion on old media, a slightly different question. Please excuse my profound ignorance on matters electronic! I have read, somewhere, that it is possible to connect HD floppy drives to elderly kit that is only expecting DD drives, and use them for just DD operation. More specifically, I'd like to resurrect my ancient Sinclair Spectrum with its MGT DISCiPLE disk interface. Way back in the 1980s, I used 5?" media, as they were still cheaper. However, now, I daresay I won't find any new 5?" media and even 3?" DD media are getting tricky. So what I was considering doing was connecting a pair of old PC floppy drives - 3?" HD (1.4MB) floppies - and quite possibly using 1.4MB media, but only formatting them to 720K and using them as 720K. IIRC, the drives permit this. The track widths are the same - both are 80t drives - it's just that DD used 9 sectors per track and HD 18. Is this likely to work? I realise I'll need to find drives with a unit selection jumper on them, so I can set one as 0 and the other as 1; no twists in the cables this far back, & I'm guessing that a twisted cable wouldn't work with a controller that wasn't expecting it...? -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From ray at arachelian.com Tue Mar 23 10:17:36 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 11:17:36 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> Andrew Burton wrote: > Some good points, but: > > - No LAN here > Even less of a non-issue. :) I was illustrating the point that even though I tell my Mac to go to sleep, most of the time, my ssh connections don't disconnect, and even when they do, there are easy solutions to reconnect without my having to manually tell them to. > - Never use sleep/standby, as when I'm finished with my laptop I usually > end up playing videogames, with the games console being powered from the > socket that the laptop plug was occupying. > It still doesn't prevent you from telling your machine to hibernate or sleep. > - I let the display go to screen saver, but never use sleep. See previous > point. > Why? It's much more environmentally friendly to tell the machine to go to sleep than it is to run its screen saver. I can understand if you're letting it run something in the background that's time consuming - say rendering video, or downloading, or backing itself up to an external drive, but otherwise, if it's not in use, an idle machine running just a screen saver is a waste of electricity, and you're better off telling it to sleep or hibernate. > On the few occasions it goes to sleep mode (usually just as the internal > battery becomes critically low), mine also takes 2 seconds to wake up (plus > a few extra to log back in). > Why not just do that all the time? Explicitly tell the machine to hibernate or sleep instead of shutting it down? That way, when you come back, everything is as you've left it and you don't need to relaunch everything. Sleep uses very little battery, most machines can sleep for several days on a good battery before having to hibernate. I can understand if you're low on disk space, you might not want it to hibernate, but that's easily solved too, make room by archiving unused files elsewhere. This isn't an new concept. Both the Lisa and the Canon Cat have had it back in the early 80's. The Newton had it in the early 90's. I'm sure there were others that may have had this feature earlier. (The Lisa didn't actually hibernate or sleep, it just remembered the state of what documents were opened at shutdown, and simply reopened them at startup. The Cat saved its state to a floppy the same way as modern day hibernation.) Most PC's and modern Macs have had these features since 2000 or so. It saves you a lot of time not having to reopen everything and everything is just where you've left it. > Who says I waste time whilst booting up or shutting down? I'm usually > watching TV when I switch it on, and usually going to bed when I shut it > down - I trundle downstairs for a drink and by the time I return it has shut > down :) > How about the time it takes you to bring up all the apps you had running, remember which documents you've had opened, and reopen them, etc? How about the electricity you waste as the machine starts up from scratch and then sits around and waits for you to come over and relaunch everything back to where it was before you powered off? >> Again, if running an OS that has a registry is problematic, that problem >> has a very easy solution. :) >> >> > > Remove the registry?!! :) > > There are operating systems without such abominations. :-) From aek at bitsavers.org Tue Mar 23 10:27:21 2010 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 08:27:21 -0700 Subject: TSX+ ??? In-Reply-To: References: <8dd2d95c1003220517m19db0618led3bc7e053a4c445@mail.gmail.com> <4BA7D3FC.9070903@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BA8DDD9.9070103@bitsavers.org> On 3/22/10 7:57 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > I've another one, what ever happened to the TSX+ that was announced a > few years ago? > Check with Lyle Bickley. From aek at bitsavers.org Tue Mar 23 10:30:18 2010 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 08:30:18 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <4BA8DE8A.6050000@bitsavers.org> If there is ever actually posts on the Disc analyzer, please change the subject line, since I've gotten tired of hundreds of off-topic posts and kill-filed this thread. From aek at bitsavers.org Tue Mar 23 10:31:13 2010 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 08:31:13 -0700 Subject: Async logic In-Reply-To: <333032.19816.qm@web111704.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <333032.19816.qm@web111704.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4BA8DEC1.4030106@bitsavers.org> On 3/23/10 4:09 AM, Julian Skidmore wrote: > > Alexey Toptygin wrote: > >> What's wrong with pulse or async logic designs? I personally find them >> fascinating, but I've never gotten to play with an implementation of >> one... Are there problems with designing like this that made people switch >> to sync designs? Anyone know of any good books on non-synchronous logic >> design? > > Probably the best resources are the Amulet resources from Manchester > University. > Or the work on logical effort by Ivan Sutherland. From trag at io.com Tue Mar 23 12:26:20 2010 From: trag at io.com (Jeff Walther) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:26:20 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Async logic In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <1e33cf55b039635cd92de12669c6237c.squirrel@webmail.prismnet.com> > > Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 08:31:13 -0700 > From: Al Kossow > On 3/23/10 4:09 AM, Julian Skidmore wrote: >> >> Alexey Toptygin wrote: >> >>> What's wrong with pulse or async logic designs? I personally find them >>> fascinating, but I've never gotten to play with an implementation of >>> one... Are there problems with designing like this that made people >>> switch >>> to sync designs? Anyone know of any good books on non-synchronous logic >>> design? >> >> Probably the best resources are the Amulet resources from Manchester >> University. >> > > Or the work on logical effort by Ivan Sutherland. I did some contract design work for a company called Theseus (Mumble) back around 2000. Their stuff was all non-clocked logic. They used two rails per bit and depending on how the two rails were coded it represented either 0, 1 or ready (or finished?), if I remember correctly. The logic to signal back the completion and readys about doubled the amount of real estate the logic used, but it could run as fast as the gates allowed, did not have a synchronizing pulse, making remote monitoring attacks difficult to impossible and only used as much power as it needed to process the actual data available. The amount of design discipline needed was substantial, making me wonder if just going to the trouble of implementing more traditional power saving techniques wasn't a better option. Jeff Walther From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 23 12:27:33 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 10:27:33 -0700 Subject: mewel In-Reply-To: <000601caca3d$53e73e80$03fea8c0@HP21680137376> References: <000601caca3d$53e73e80$03fea8c0@HP21680137376> Message-ID: <4BA89795.7008.2B59C7@cclist.sydex.com> On 22 Mar 2010 at 21:00, Patrick McLeod wrote: > Does anybody have the source code and libarays for the old MEWEL > windows interface? > > I have been looking for this so the source code for a Juki Pick and > Place machine can be updated. I have the source; licensed it from Magma sometime in the mid-90's-- and never used it. However, given that this is still copyrighted software, I need to know that you have a valid source license or that you got clearance from Marc Adler. A simple google search shows that Marc is still around at least as of the 6th of this month: http://magmasystems.blogspot.com/ At least as of last year, Marc was at Citigroup in Manhattan. I have this email for him, but I don't know if it's current: magmasystems at yahoo.com At any rate Marc's not dead or disappeared. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 23 12:35:09 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 10:35:09 -0700 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> On 23 Mar 2010 at 12:44, Liam Proven wrote: > Noting the discussion on old media, a slightly different question. > > Please excuse my profound ignorance on matters electronic! > > I have read, somewhere, that it is possible to connect HD floppy > drives to elderly kit that is only expecting DD drives, and use them > for just DD operation. Yes, that should work, but HD drives generally don't provide a READY/ output on pin 34 and some systems require this signal. For example, my old Amstrad Joyce looks for the READY/ signal on pin 34 of the interface, which is DISK CHANGED/ on most HD drives. Tying the pin low generally works for all but those uncommon applications that poll READY to see if a disk has changed. As far as select--while it's nice to have a drive with select jumpers, it's also possible to take an inexpensive drive that's permanently wired as DS1 and simply swap the DS1 and DS0 lines at the connector--not exactly the "IBM PC twist", because you want to leave the motor conrol pins as-is. So the "twist" to get a DS1-only drive to recognize DS0 would be the 3-wire bundle 12-13-14. --Chuck From auringer at tds.net Tue Mar 23 12:44:38 2010 From: auringer at tds.net (auringer tds.net) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:44:38 -0500 Subject: Tektronix manuals available Message-ID: <3187f0031003231044p6a16a753l8249838bd81f4dd6@mail.gmail.com> Hello, I have the following Tek Instruction Manuals sitting here. I would like to free up the space they are consuming. If someone wants to make it worth my while to spend the time shipping them out, I will entertain offers. Otherwise, I will dump them in the recycling. Preference will go to the fewest number of boxes I have to deal with and, of course, compensation offered. I will accept offers until Sunday (28th) evening. I will ship or recycle Monday. Shipping from 53714. Jon -- 7904 Oscilloscope operators 7904 Oscilloscope Service 7A13 Differential Comparator 7A19 Amplifier 7A26 Dual Trace Amplifier 7B92A Dual Time Base 7B80 Time Base 7B85 Delaying Time Base 7M11 50-Ohm Delay Line S-6 Sampling Head S-52 Pulse Generator Head S-53 Trigger Recognizer Head C-5C Camera 2215 Oscilloscope Service P6056/P6057 Probe P6131 Passive Probe P6460 Data Acquisition Probe K212 Portable Instrument Cart 1240 Workbook I also have "data sheets" for the following items: P6063B Passive Probe 200C Scope-Mobile Cart From alhartman at yahoo.com Tue Mar 23 13:08:53 2010 From: alhartman at yahoo.com (Al Hartman) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 11:08:53 -0700 (PDT) Subject: cctalk Digest, Vol 79, Issue 44 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <820389.8236.qm@web55302.mail.re4.yahoo.com> I don't know what the market is like in Europe, but I can still buy new media in 5.25" and 3.5" format easily here in the U.S. Google brings up many places here. If there are no such outlets in the UK, maybe you can get a bulk order together with some local folks to save on the shipping costs? Al From: Liam Proven Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* Noting the discussion on old media, a slightly different question. Please excuse my profound ignorance on matters electronic! I have read, somewhere, that it is possible to connect HD floppy drives to elderly kit that is only expecting DD drives, and use them for just DD operation. More specifically, I'd like to resurrect my ancient Sinclair Spectrum with its MGT DISCiPLE disk interface. Way back in the 1980s, I used 5?" media, as they were still cheaper. However, now, I daresay I won't find any new 5?" media and even 3?" DD media are getting tricky. So what I was considering doing was connecting a pair of old PC floppy drives - 3?" HD (1.4MB) floppies - and quite possibly using 1.4MB media, but only formatting them to 720K and using them as 720K. IIRC, the drives permit this. The track widths are the same - both are 80t drives - it's just that DD used 9 sectors per track and HD 18. Is this likely to work? I realise I'll need to find drives with a unit selection jumper on them, so I can set one as 0 and the other as 1; no twists in the cables this far back, & I'm guessing that a twisted cable wouldn't work with a controller that wasn't expecting it...? -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From pete at dunnington.plus.com Tue Mar 23 13:31:42 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 18:31:42 +0000 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> On 23/03/2010 17:35, Chuck Guzis wrote: > As far as select--while it's nice to have a drive with select > jumpers, it's also possible to take an inexpensive drive that's > permanently wired as DS1 and simply swap the DS1 and DS0 lines at the > connector--not exactly the "IBM PC twist", because you want to leave > the motor conrol pins as-is. So the "twist" to get a DS1-only drive > to recognize DS0 would be the 3-wire bundle 12-13-14. Er, no, DS0 is pin 10 so it would be 10-11-12. The "IBM twist" swaps DS1 (Device Select B, in IBM parlance) and DS2 (Device Select A) rather than DS0 and DS1, and additionally swaps MotorOn with DS0. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From lproven at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 13:58:26 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 18:58:26 +0000 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:31 PM, Pete Turnbull wrote: > On 23/03/2010 17:35, Chuck Guzis wrote: > >> As far as select--while it's nice to have a drive with select jumpers, >> it's also possible to take an inexpensive drive that's permanently wired as >> DS1 and simply swap the DS1 and DS0 lines at the connector--not exactly the >> "IBM PC twist", because you want to leave the motor conrol pins as-is. ?So >> the "twist" to get a DS1-only drive to recognize DS0 would be the 3-wire >> bundle 12-13-14. > > Er, no, DS0 is pin 10 so it would be 10-11-12. ?The "IBM twist" swaps DS1 > (Device Select B, in IBM parlance) and DS2 (Device Select A) rather than DS0 > and DS1, and additionally swaps MotorOn with DS0. Thanks, both! I have a few bare drives knocking around, some of which are, I hope, elderly enough that they have DS jumpers. If not, I don't think I fancy trying to make this cable up... 8?( -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 23 14:12:32 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:12:32 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20100323120238.N39356@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Liam Proven wrote: > Noting the discussion on old media, a slightly different question. > Please excuse my profound ignorance on matters electronic! > I have read, somewhere, that it is possible to connect HD floppy > drives to elderly kit that is only expecting DD drives, and use them > for just DD operation. Yes. Check the pinout, and make sure that there isn't some other signal on the pin for the RWC signal. > So what I was considering doing was connecting a pair of old PC floppy > drives - 3?" HD (1.4MB) floppies - and quite possibly using 1.4MB > media, but only formatting them to 720K and using them as 720K. IIRC, > the drives permit this. ALL? (that'll probably get me into trouble) "1.4M" drives also supported the lower density "720K" mode. Use "720K" diskettes. Depending on the particular machine, you may need to add command line options to tell the OS which type of format to do. /F:2 /T:80/N:9 /F:720 and many other possibilities, depending on which OS, and version thereof > The track widths are the same - both are 80t drives - it's just that > DD used 9 sectors per track and HD 18. That's right. 135 tracks per inch > Is this likely to work? I realise I'll need to find drives with a unit > selection jumper on them, so I can set one as 0 and the other as 1; no > twists in the cables this far back, & I'm guessing that a twisted > cable wouldn't work with a controller that wasn't expecting it...? Why not? The whole reason for the twisted cable was so that when controller would send signals to drives 0 and 1, the correct drive would respons, in spite of both drives being jumpered as "B:". WHY did they do it that way? One reason was so that users, and "technicians" at Computerland, etc., would not need to figure out and understand jumpers. From geneb at deltasoft.com Tue Mar 23 14:19:04 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:19:04 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Liam Proven wrote: > On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:31 PM, Pete Turnbull wrote: >> On 23/03/2010 17:35, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> >>> As far as select--while it's nice to have a drive with select jumpers, >>> it's also possible to take an inexpensive drive that's permanently wired as >>> DS1 and simply swap the DS1 and DS0 lines at the connector--not exactly the >>> "IBM PC twist", because you want to leave the motor conrol pins as-is. ?So >>> the "twist" to get a DS1-only drive to recognize DS0 would be the 3-wire >>> bundle 12-13-14. >> >> Er, no, DS0 is pin 10 so it would be 10-11-12. ?The "IBM twist" swaps DS1 >> (Device Select B, in IBM parlance) and DS2 (Device Select A) rather than DS0 >> and DS1, and additionally swaps MotorOn with DS0. > > Thanks, both! > > I have a few bare drives knocking around, some of which are, I hope, > elderly enough that they have DS jumpers. If not, I don't think I > fancy trying to make this cable up... 8?( > How are you going to handle the data rate difference? If memory serves, using 1.44MB media results in a higher RPM and a higher data rate. g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From brianlanning at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 14:28:47 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 14:28:47 -0500 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003231228l69242f35h357d5d91abf96e77@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 2:19 PM, Gene Buckle wrote: > How are you going to handle the data rate difference? If memory serves, > using 1.44MB media results in a higher RPM and a higher data rate. > I'm arriving late to the conversation, so maybe I missed something. High density floppies have a square hole opposite the right protect tab up in the corner. Most 3.5" floppy drives have a switch that detects this hole and does (here's my hardware knowledge black hole) something different with the media. 720k double density floppies don't have this hole. So you should be able to simply cover the holes with tape or disable the switch the right way and the drive will treat the media like a double density disk. >From what I remember, there's issues with this though. First, the read/write head is thinner which I believe causes problems when you put that disk back into a real double density drive and one of the drives is slightly misaligned. Also, I think the actual media may be different, as in different magnetic properties. There's my highly technical explanation of making HD disks work like DD disks. :-P brian From rivie at ridgenet.net Tue Mar 23 14:32:29 2010 From: rivie at ridgenet.net (Roger Ivie) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:32:29 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Gene Buckle wrote: > How are you going to handle the data rate difference? If memory serves, > using 1.44MB media results in a higher RPM and a higher data rate. 3.5" drives don't change speed; they always run at 300 RPM. That's why HD diskettes hold 1.44MB instead of 1.2MB. The average PC HD 5.25" *also* doesn't change speed, but runs at 360 RPM instead of the usual 300 RPM. That's why you need a data separator that runs at 300 KHz instead of 250 KHz to read a DD diskette in the average PC HD 5.25" drive. The DEC RX33 5.25" drive *does* change speed. It runs at 300 RPM for DD media and 360 RPM for HD media. -- roger ivie rivie at ridgenet.net From geneb at deltasoft.com Tue Mar 23 14:43:52 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:43:52 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Roger Ivie wrote: > On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Gene Buckle wrote: >> How are you going to handle the data rate difference? If memory serves, >> using 1.44MB media results in a higher RPM and a higher data rate. > > 3.5" drives don't change speed; they always run at 300 RPM. That's why > HD diskettes hold 1.44MB instead of 1.2MB. > > The average PC HD 5.25" *also* doesn't change speed, but runs at 360 RPM > instead of the usual 300 RPM. That's why you need a data separator that > runs at 300 KHz instead of 250 KHz to read a DD diskette in the average > PC HD 5.25" drive. > > The DEC RX33 5.25" drive *does* change speed. It runs at 300 RPM for DD > media and 360 RPM for HD media. > Hrm. I could have sworn they ran at 360. *bangs head* Must have been a stuck bit. :) g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 23 14:44:40 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:44:40 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20100323123544.W39356@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Gene Buckle wrote: > How are you going to handle the data rate difference? If memory serves, > using 1.44MB media results in a higher RPM and a higher data rate. "720K" is 250K bits per second at 300 RPM ("DD diskettes) (except for some old Sony drives (ask Tony) which ran at 500K/600RPM) "1.4M" is 500K bits per second at 300 RPM ("HD" diskettes) "2.8M" is 1000K bits per second at 300 RPM ("ED" diskettes (barium-ferrite, vertical? recording)) SOME (NOT ALL) 5.25" drives switched back and forth between 300 and 360RPM, requiring 250K and 500K bits per second. SOME (NOT ALL) 5.25" drives stayed at 300RPM, requiring 300K and 500K bits per second. The AT disk controller supported 250K, 300K, and 500K data transfer rates, under software control -- THAT port and its code is the only part of INT13h that isn't commented in the AT Technical Reference Manual. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 23 14:49:56 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:49:56 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003231228l69242f35h357d5d91abf96e77@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> <6dbe3c381003231228l69242f35h357d5d91abf96e77@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20100323124553.O39356@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Brian Lanning wrote: > I'm arriving late to the conversation, so maybe I missed something. High > density floppies have a square hole opposite the right protect tab up in the > corner. Most 3.5" floppy drives have a switch that detects this hole and > does (here's my hardware knowledge black hole) something different with the > media. 720k double density floppies don't have this hole. Yes. Well, MOST drives. The "something different" is a change in the R/W current level. Not ALL drives have that sensor. In the early PS/2 "1.44" drives, that is controlled by a signal from the controller to the drives. > So you should be able to simply cover the holes with tape or disable the > switch the right way and the drive will treat the media like a double > density disk. > > >From what I remember, there's issues with this though. First, the > read/write head is thinner which I believe causes problems when you put that > disk back into a real double density drive and one of the drives is slightly > misaligned. Nope. That's the case with "360K" v "1.2M" 5.25". 3.5" is the same 135TPI for both. > Also, I think the actual media may be different, as in > different magnetic properties. Yes. 600 Oersted v ~750 Oersted. From lproven at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 14:38:58 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:38:58 +0000 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003231238x6d48ed27pce684c55024ecf22@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 7:19 PM, Gene Buckle wrote: > On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Liam Proven wrote: > >> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:31 PM, Pete Turnbull >> wrote: >>> >>> On 23/03/2010 17:35, Chuck Guzis wrote: >>> >>>> As far as select--while it's nice to have a drive with select jumpers, >>>> it's also possible to take an inexpensive drive that's permanently wired >>>> as >>>> DS1 and simply swap the DS1 and DS0 lines at the connector--not exactly >>>> the >>>> "IBM PC twist", because you want to leave the motor conrol pins as-is. >>>> ?So >>>> the "twist" to get a DS1-only drive to recognize DS0 would be the 3-wire >>>> bundle 12-13-14. >>> >>> Er, no, DS0 is pin 10 so it would be 10-11-12. ?The "IBM twist" swaps DS1 >>> (Device Select B, in IBM parlance) and DS2 (Device Select A) rather than >>> DS0 >>> and DS1, and additionally swaps MotorOn with DS0. >> >> Thanks, both! >> >> I have a few bare drives knocking around, some of which are, I hope, >> elderly enough that they have DS jumpers. If not, I don't think I >> fancy trying to make this cable up... 8?( >> > How are you going to handle the data rate difference? ?If memory serves, > using ?1.44MB media results in a higher RPM and a higher data rate. I wasn't planning on trying to format, access or otherwise use 1.4MB disks as 1.4MB. Just format them to /less/ than capacity and treat 'em as normal. The machine is a Sinclair Spectrum, although I also have a QL it would be fun to revive this way. On neither is there any option to select /how/ you format the disks, I believe. Both only support 80-track DS DD drives & disks. The Spectrum+DISCiPLE put 780K or so on a disk, I think. I've never tried to attach my QL to its disk interface... -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 23 14:54:06 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:54:06 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <20100323123544.W39356@shell.lmi.net> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> <20100323123544.W39356@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20100323125107.Q39356@shell.lmi.net> CORRECTION: > SOME (NOT ALL) 5.25" drives switched back and forth between 300 and SOME (NOT ALL) "1.2M" drives switched back and forth between 300 and > 360RPM, requiring 250K and 500K bits per second. > SOME (NOT ALL) 5.25" drives stayed at 300RPM, requiring 300K and 500K SOME (NOT ALL) "1.2M" drives stayed at 360RPM, requiring 300K and 500K > bits per second. "360K" drives were 300 RPM, requiring 250K bits per second From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 23 14:06:12 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:06:12 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: <20100322174638.Y220@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Mar 22, 10 05:54:08 pm Message-ID: > In addition to all that, . . . > The coercivity (sorta like magnetic sensitivity) is WRONG. > "720K" diskettes are 600 Oersted. > "1.4M" diskettes are about 750 Oersted. > > It IS close (unlike 360K (300 Oersted) v 1.2M (600 Oersted)), and it WILL > work (unlike 360K v 1.2M), but it will NOT be as reliable as using the > correct diskette. Nowadays it is much easier to get HD disks than DD ones, which is a problem users of old machines that never had an HD drive/controller. The think I am thining of primarily are the HP 3.5" drives (both HPIB and HPIL models), but of course there are many other machines. I wonder if increasign the write current would help. It should only be a matter of changing one resistor. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 23 14:27:18 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:27:18 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <20100323090051.6c5aea59.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> from "Jochen Kunz" at Mar 23, 10 09:00:51 am Message-ID: > > On Mon, 22 Mar 2010 19:01:14 +0000 (GMT) > ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote: > > > There are 2 reelated problems. With a modern-ish microprocessor (external= > =20 > > program store, but things like instruction pipelines, prefetch buffers,=20 > > etc), you can't know what the CPU is actually doing at any point. If you= > =20 > > have an internal cache, it is of course even worse. > Well. If you need more compute power then a 8085 you have to apply > advanced technics such as caches and superscalar CPUs. Even if you can For an awful lot of applications you don't need more power than an old 8 bit processor IMHO. Think of the large number of small PICs, 8051s, etc thatare are in use. > get away with a small 8 bit controller you want a high integrated > single chip solution. At least I do. A single Atmel AVR with ISP > programmer is so much more comfortable to use, cheaper and faster to > deploy then a whole board filled with CPU, RAM, ROM, IO, ... A single > chip solution will work out of the box. A discrete CPU, RAM, ROM, No it doesn;t, you have to write the firmware :-). Amd that is the problem. > IO, ... solution needs lots of debuging in itself before I can start to > address the real problem. Eh? A simple microcprocessor + ROM + RAM + a couple of I/O chips will work first time. It doesn't need to be debugged. In any case, what I would prefer is a chip containing CPU + RAM + I/O + clock generator _but not program store_, and an external EPROM for that last function, That as I've said repeatedly makes firmware debugging a lot easier. > Tony, I am afraid you have no clue what modern microcontrolers do. E.g. I beg to differ. > the controler in my washing machine can detect how much dirty laundry > is in the machine. It does this by measuring the amount of soaked up That statement is nonsense for the following reason. A microcontroller _on its own_ can't possibly know anything about water of laundry. What it can do is take inputs from sensors that measure physical quantiies in the washing machine and control other devices (watere inlet valve, etc) based on thase values. The distinction ius importqant, because the first problem is 'what physical quantiities need to be measured'. In the case of a washing machine, the normal one is th water pressure at the bottom of the drum. This, of coruse depends on the water level, rather than the actual volume of water that's been let in. If your laundry absorbs a lot of water, you need to let in more water for the same level. Now you don';t need a microcontroller for that. Our old washing machine had a water level sensor that consisted of a diaphragm linked by a tube to the bottom of the druve. Operating on the outside of the diaphragm was a spring, the tension of which could be adjusted by a user control. And therew as a quick make break swtich attacehd to it. When there was enough water in the drum, the swtich snapped over, turned off the water inlet valve, started the motor, and enabled the circuit to the heater element (so the heater couldn't run if there was no water in the machine). FWIWM that machine ran for well over 35 years with no major failures. I replaced rubber parts (hoses, seals) occasionally. I think I changed the bearings for the drum once. And a very minor repair on the cam-timer. The washing machine that replaced it has no more _useful_ features, it doesn't get the laundry any cleaner. It doesn't sue significantly less water (in fact it probably uses more, sicne there's no user control for water level). And after 5 years I've already had to replace the motor control module because the microcontroller on it haf failed (they wouldn't sell just the chip :-(, and yes it was certainly the microcontroller that had failed). > water. So the machine uses only as much water as is needed. I.e. if the > machine isn't loaded to the max. it will use less water and thus less > energy for heating and less detregent. Every washing machine I've ever seen or used uses the amount of detergent that you put in it. I've never seen one where you put in an entire box of poweder and lt uses what it thinks it beeds. > An other example. Modern car engine management systems do a closed loop > simulation of the engine they control. (State observer a la Luenberger > or Kalman filter.) This way the management system can estimate e.g. > themperatures in various parts of the engine. This is needed to > optimize ignition and fuel injection timing, ... and thus minimize fuel > consumtion. A modern Disel common rail injection is a highly I did say 'most' and not 'all' uses of microcntrollerss ;-) Seriously, there are places where they are the right thing to use. And there are places where they are not. However, all to often so-called designmrs want to solcve every problem with a mircocontroller... I've got a couple of almost indentcial (to the user) devices in front of me. One uses an 8-pin PIC and a motor controller IC. The other uses 10 discrete transsitors (and no ICs at all). You can guess which one I prefer. > sophisticated mechatronical system. Not to talk about anti-lock brake > system... This is somthing I definitely want as it saves my money and > enhances safety. But you can't do this with a 8085. The total cost of a car is not primarily the cost of the fuel IMHO. Considerign the fuel economy from electronic engine management doesn't seem to be that great (based on the cars I've worked on -- I don't drive), and considerign they are much more expensive for me to repair, I am not at all convinced it will save me money in the end. -tony From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 15:04:52 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 16:04:52 -0400 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 3:32 PM, Roger Ivie wrote: > On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Gene Buckle wrote: >> >> How are you going to handle the data rate difference? ?If memory serves, >> using ?1.44MB media results in a higher RPM and a higher data rate. > > 3.5" drives don't change speed; they always run at 300 RPM. That's why > HD diskettes hold 1.44MB instead of 1.2MB. Ordinary "PC" 3.5" drives don't change speed, but Amiga high-density drives do - they spin at 150 RPM when high-density media are inserted, maintaining the double-density data rate. This is because it was judged more economical to make a custom drive than to design a new Paula chip (for those that don't know, unlike in a PC, with the Amiga, there is no single "floppy controller" per se - the necessary functions are performed by a combination of CIA I/O pins, a massive shift register in the Paula chip and logical miniterms applied by Agnes to decode/encode the data to/from MFM). One advantage of changing the drive vs changing the chip is that any Amiga can take an HD drive, not just new models (the HD drive came in around the same time as the A3000, IIRC). The official drive may be the Chinon FZ-357A, but I am not in the room with an Amiga to verify that. It's unlikely to run across one of these drives outside of an Amiga context, but they did exist (and I do have a couple of them - they even work under emulators like A-Max and Shapeshifter to read high-density (FDHD) Mac disks). > The DEC RX33 5.25" drive *does* change speed. It runs at 300 RPM for DD > media and 360 RPM for HD media. That's interesting to note, considering the RX33 is a specifically-strapped Teac FD55GFR (usable on a "regular" PC when suitably re-strapped). -ethan From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 23 15:07:29 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 13:07:29 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BBC-Micro] Re-using floppies In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100323130504.Y39356@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: > Nowadays it is much easier to get HD disks than DD ones, which is a > problem users of old machines that never had an HD drive/controller. The > think I am thining of primarily are the HP 3.5" drives (both HPIB and > HPIL models), but of course there are many other machines. > I wonder if increasign the write current would help. It should only be a > matter of changing one resistor. Modifying the drive to use the other diskettes should work. Would that be an increase or a decrease in the current? But, you should keep a convenient way to switch back when using real DD diskettes. From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 23 15:13:34 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 13:13:34 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20100323131003.V39356@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Ethan Dicks wrote: > Ordinary "PC" 3.5" drives don't change speed, but Amiga high-density > drives do - they spin at 150 RPM when high-density media are inserted, > maintaining the double-density data rate. This is because it was > judged more economical to make a custom drive than to design a new > Paula chip (for those that don't know, unlike in a PC, with the Amiga, > there is no single "floppy controller" per se - the necessary > functions are performed by a combination of CIA I/O pins, a massive > shift register in the Paula chip and logical miniterms applied by > Agnes to decode/encode the data to/from MFM). One advantage of > changing the drive vs changing the chip is that any Amiga can take an > HD drive, not just new models (the HD drive came in around the same > time as the A3000, IIRC). The official drive may be the Chinon > FZ-357A, but I am not in the room with an Amiga to verify that. > It's unlikely to run across one of these drives outside of an Amiga > context, but they did exist (and I do have a couple of them - they > even work under emulators like A-Max and Shapeshifter to read > high-density (FDHD) Mac disks). The same trick was used by Weltec. They made a 180RPM 5.25" drive to be able to read and write PC "1.2M" diskettes with a "360K" controller (250K bits per second). It wasn't very reliable. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 23 15:06:34 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:06:34 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <20100323120238.N39356@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Mar 23, 10 12:12:32 pm Message-ID: > > Is this likely to work? I realise I'll need to find drives with a unit > > selection jumper on them, so I can set one as 0 and the other as 1; no > > twists in the cables this far back, & I'm guessing that a twisted > > cable wouldn't work with a controller that wasn't expecting it...? > > Why not? The whole reason for the twisted cable was so that when > controller would send signals to drives 0 and 1, the correct drive would > respons, in spite of both drives being jumpered as "B:". Err, the IBM twisted cable did more than that. It also swaped MotorOn/ with (IIRC) DS0, so that the MotorOn/ signals for the 2 drives on the cable ended up on differnt pins at the controller end. That way the cotnroller could control the 2 motors independanty. Ulness the cotnroller is expecting that, an IBM OPC twisted cable is not going to work. What will work is a cable that leaves all signals apart from the drive selects alone and moves the drive select signals around so that each drive select output of the cotroller ends up on the 'active' drive select signal (normally DS1/ for a PC drive) of a differnt drive. > WHY did they do it that way? One reason was so that users, and > "technicians" at Computerland, etc., would not need to figure out and > understand jumpers. I am not convinced that was the real reason. After all, with the 5.25" full-height drives in the PC you had to fit a terminating ressitor package to the last drive on the cable (And yes, IBM did get that right). Anyone who could fit/remove resstor packs correctly could set jumpers. I still think the real reason was to have separate motor-on signals for the 2 drvies. The fact that it allowed all drives to be strapped the same way is a bonus. -tony From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 23 15:28:27 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 16:28:27 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <746B553C-2BC8-498C-9220-5A1B00F7458F@neurotica.com> On Mar 23, 2010, at 3:27 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >>> There are 2 reelated problems. With a modern-ish microprocessor >>> (external= >> =20 >>> program store, but things like instruction pipelines, prefetch >>> buffers,=20 >>> etc), you can't know what the CPU is actually doing at any point. >>> If you= >> =20 >>> have an internal cache, it is of course even worse. >> Well. If you need more compute power then a 8085 you have to apply >> advanced technics such as caches and superscalar CPUs. Even if you >> can > > For an awful lot of applications you don't need more power than an > old 8 > bit processor IMHO. Or a NEW 8-bit processor, for that matter. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From pete at dunnington.plus.com Tue Mar 23 16:26:42 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:26:42 +0000 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BA93212.1040106@dunnington.plus.com> On 23/03/2010 19:19, Gene Buckle wrote: > How are you going to handle the data rate difference? If memory serves, > using 1.44MB media results in a higher RPM and a higher data rate. All 3.5" drives spin at 300rpm[1] and don't change the rotational speed when switching between DD and HD. 5.25" HD-capable drives sometimes do; many can run at either 300rpm or 360rpm, and sometimes that's controlled by the Density Select pin on the interface. Sometimes not, in which case the norm is to run them at 360rpm even for DD, but use 300kbps data rate for that instead of 250kbps. Otherwise, the standard is to use 250kbps at 300rpm for DD, and 500kbps at 360rpm for HD -- which is why you only get 1.2MB on a 5.25" HD disk when you get 1.44MB[2] on a 3.5" HD disk: 500kbps at 300rpm fits more sectors in. [1] Apart from early 600rpm drives, such as some Sony drives, that use twice the data rate, ie 500kbps for double-density MFM. [2] for certain ludicrously illogical definitions of MB -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 23 16:41:50 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 14:41:50 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <746B553C-2BC8-498C-9220-5A1B00F7458F@neurotica.com> References: , <746B553C-2BC8-498C-9220-5A1B00F7458F@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4BA8D32E.28377.114278E@cclist.sydex.com> On 23 Mar 2010 at 16:28, Dave McGuire wrote: > > For an awful lot of applications you don't need more power than an > > old 8 bit processor IMHO. > > Or a NEW 8-bit processor, for that matter. ...and I DO like new processors. But I wonder if 8-bit uC's are long for this world, at least in the commercial area. The Cortex M0 ARM CPUs appear to be coming on pretty strong. Why buy 8 bits when you can get 32 for the same price in an upward-compatible package? --Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 23 16:54:09 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 14:54:09 -0700 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <4BA93212.1040106@dunnington.plus.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com>, , <4BA93212.1040106@dunnington.plus.com> Message-ID: <4BA8D611.18866.11F6FEC@cclist.sydex.com> On 23 Mar 2010 at 21:26, Pete Turnbull wrote: > All 3.5" drives spin at 300rpm[1] and don't change the rotational > speed when switching between DD and HD. Ever use much PC98 Japanese gear? They use 3.5" HD floppies that spin at 360K, just like 5.25" HD and their 8" cousins. It makes a lot of sense--the format doesn't change, just the physical size of the medium does. You see these a lot on Japanese and Korean CNC and lab gear, as well as the veneered and generated NEC PC9801 series of personal computers. Most makes of 3.5" drives can be jumpered or switched (although it may not be documented very well) to run at 360 RPM and some--such as most USB floppies and Imation Superdrives can detect the recording density and switch automatically. Related to this, I received two floppies in for "copying" a couple of weeks ago--a 3.5" DSHD and a 32 sector 8", with the admonition that both floppies contained exactly the same information. (Hear the head scratching?). The recording method was clearly MFM, but with unique address marks and track layout. The hard-sectored 8" turned out to be a red herring--the layout of data on the track didn't follow the sectoring at all--I suspect that someone jumpered the 8" drives for HS operation so that they could use a stock of old 32-sector media. That way, you still get only one index pulse (but 32 sector pulses on a different pin). But the 3.5", while the spitting image of the 8", wasn't identical. It had been recorded at 300 RPM, so there was about 2000 bytes of information on the last half of each track that duplicated that on the first half--and, predictably, the last of the duplicated sectors was truncated at the index. Probably someone's hack. Personally, I'd rather stick with the 8" media, as it's far more robust than the 3.5" stuff. If 3.5" drives were required, I'd run them at 360 RPM. Cheers, Chuck From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 23 17:00:45 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 18:00:45 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA8D32E.28377.114278E@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <746B553C-2BC8-498C-9220-5A1B00F7458F@neurotica.com> <4BA8D32E.28377.114278E@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Mar 23, 2010, at 5:41 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: >>> For an awful lot of applications you don't need more power than an >>> old 8 bit processor IMHO. >> >> Or a NEW 8-bit processor, for that matter. > > ...and I DO like new processors. But I wonder if 8-bit uC's are > long for this world, at least in the commercial area. The Cortex M0 > ARM CPUs appear to be coming on pretty strong. Why buy 8 bits when > you can get 32 for the same price in an upward-compatible package? That's certainly a valid point. 8-bitters won't go away anytime soon, though. Engineers tend to design with what they know, and while 32-bitters are getting cheaper, well, 8-bitters are too. Further, one can design an mcs51-based chip without paying a dime to anyone...can't exactly do that with ARM. I think there will always be a market for small processors. FWIW, I've seen people loudly predicting the death of 8-bit processors for well over twenty years now. They're still here. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 23 16:59:54 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 14:59:54 -0700 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com>, <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com>, <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> Message-ID: <4BA8D76A.25525.124B440@cclist.sydex.com> On 23 Mar 2010 at 18:31, Pete Turnbull wrote: > Er, no, DS0 is pin 10 so it would be 10-11-12. The "IBM twist" swaps > DS1 (Device Select B, in IBM parlance) and DS2 (Device Select A) > rather than DS0 and DS1, and additionally swaps MotorOn with DS0. D'oh! I picked up the closest pinout chart at hand, and wouldn't you know it--it was a PeeCee pinout. 10-11-12 it is. A mini-twist. --Chuck From chrise at pobox.com Tue Mar 23 12:25:10 2010 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:25:10 -0500 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20100323172510.GH24331@n0jcf.net> On Tuesday (03/23/2010 at 12:44PM +0000), Liam Proven wrote: > I have read, somewhere, that it is possible to connect HD floppy > drives to elderly kit that is only expecting DD drives, and use them > for just DD operation. > > More specifically, I'd like to resurrect my ancient Sinclair Spectrum > with its MGT DISCiPLE disk interface. Way back in the 1980s, I used > 5?" media, as they were still cheaper. However, now, I daresay I won't > find any new 5?" media and even 3?" DD media are getting tricky. > > So what I was considering doing was connecting a pair of old PC floppy > drives - 3?" HD (1.4MB) floppies - and quite possibly using 1.4MB > media, but only formatting them to 720K and using them as 720K. IIRC, > the drives permit this. > > The track widths are the same - both are 80t drives - it's just that > DD used 9 sectors per track and HD 18. > > Is this likely to work? I realise I'll need to find drives with a unit > selection jumper on them, so I can set one as 0 and the other as 1; no > twists in the cables this far back, & I'm guessing that a twisted > cable wouldn't work with a controller that wasn't expecting it...? I did a thing for the Heathkit H8/H89 world that emulates 10-hole, hard-sector floppies using 720K, 3.5" drives. An AVR micro synthesizes the missing sector holes and then the controller thinks it is talking to an age-old 5.25" drive with 10-sector media installed. To make it work though, I had to use 3.5" drives that also support 720K format. That means that they have to have the sensor that detects the density hole in the upper left corner of the 3.5" media. When that hole is blocked, the media is supposed to be 720K and this causes the drive to run at 250Kbps instead of the normal 500Kbps rate it does when doing 1.44MB mode. We have used 1.44MB media with this scheme by putting a piece of black tape over the hole in the upper left corner of the 1.44MB floppy thereby fooling the drive into thinking 720K media is installed. It works OK. Nobody has done any longevity studies or anything like that but the gut feel is that these 3.5", whether they are true 720K or hacked 1.44MB, are more robust and will last longer than the 10-hole hard-sector 5.25" we are replacing and can't really buy any longer. With regard to the drive selects, I chose to leave the drives alone-- leave them strapped like they would be if they went into a PC and I even use the PC style cable with crossed selects and then I adapt the selects from the legacy host controller to line up with the selects in this "PC world". Chris -- Chris Elmquist From adamg at pobox.com Tue Mar 23 14:20:18 2010 From: adamg at pobox.com (Adam Goldman) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 15:20:18 -0400 Subject: chemistry simulator on Apple ][? Message-ID: <20100323192018.GA55779@silme.pair.com> Dave McGuire wrote: > A local friend is looking for an old chemistry simulator program >for the Apple ][. Here's his description: > >> I'm trying to find a "chemistry simulator" program that I used to play >> with on an Apple II way back in the day. I don't remember the name of >> it, but I remember being able to build a decent "lab" out of parts and >> pieces. I remember that the first lesson was an experiment to figure >> out why the fertilizer ship in Texas City exploded after an onboard >> fire. This was called Chem Lab, and I think it was published by Simon & Schuster. -- Adam From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 23 17:07:31 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 18:07:31 -0400 Subject: chemistry simulator on Apple ][? In-Reply-To: <20100323192018.GA55779@silme.pair.com> References: <20100323192018.GA55779@silme.pair.com> Message-ID: <3D3675A9-7ACB-4BA3-BA88-92C72201F53A@neurotica.com> On Mar 23, 2010, at 3:20 PM, Adam Goldman wrote: >> A local friend is looking for an old chemistry simulator program >> for the Apple ][. Here's his description: >> >>> I'm trying to find a "chemistry simulator" program that I used to >>> play >>> with on an Apple II way back in the day. I don't remember the >>> name of >>> it, but I remember being able to build a decent "lab" out of >>> parts and >>> pieces. I remember that the first lesson was an experiment to >>> figure >>> out why the fertilizer ship in Texas City exploded after an onboard >>> fire. > > This was called Chem Lab, and I think it was published by Simon & > Schuster. Fantastic, thanks! I'm looking for a copy, should anyone here have it around somewhere. Thanks, -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Tue Mar 23 16:47:47 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:47:47 -0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ray Arachelian" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2010 3:17 PM Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > Andrew Burton wrote: > > - Never use sleep/standby, as when I'm finished with my laptop I usually > > end up playing videogames, with the games console being powered from the > > socket that the laptop plug was occupying. > > > It still doesn't prevent you from telling your machine to hibernate or > sleep. I suppose not, but.... *see below* (the point about the battery!) > > - I let the display go to screen saver, but never use sleep. See previous > > point. > > > Why? It's much more environmentally friendly to tell the machine to go > to sleep than it is to run its screen saver. I can understand if you're > letting it run something in the background that's time consuming - say > rendering video, or downloading, or backing itself up to an external > drive, but otherwise, if it's not in use, an idle machine running just a > screen saver is a waste of electricity, and you're better off telling it > to sleep or hibernate. > Yes, the screen saver is only running whilst I'm away for a few minutes (e.g. eating a hot meal) and I'm usually downloading something at the time. > > > On the few occasions it goes to sleep mode (usually just as the internal > > battery becomes critically low), mine also takes 2 seconds to wake up (plus > > a few extra to log back in). > > > > Why not just do that all the time? Explicitly tell the machine to > hibernate or sleep instead of shutting it down? That way, when you come > back, everything is as you've left it and you don't need to relaunch > everything. > > Sleep uses very little battery, most machines can sleep for several days > on a good battery before having to hibernate. I can understand if > you're low on disk space, you might not want it to hibernate, but that's > easily solved too, make room by archiving unused files elsewhere. > Now you see theres the other problem. This is an old 2nd-hand laptop and the internal battery is all but gone - it lasts about 5 minutes after the laptop as been switched on. When I got it the battery lasted about 40 minutes. Foolishly, I got a replacement from China. I haven't used the replacement as i) it looks suspicious too me (and being from China is probably fake/faulty) and ii) the power ratings on it differ to my official battery and I wouldn't want anything to happen to my laptop. So how long does a "good battery" normally last? I know modern laptops can last up to 8 hours or so (assuming I'm not mis-remembering). > This isn't an new concept. Both the Lisa and the Canon Cat have had it > back in the early 80's. The Newton had it in the early 90's. I'm sure > there were others that may have had this feature earlier. > (The Lisa didn't actually hibernate or sleep, it just remembered the > state of what documents were opened at shutdown, and simply reopened > them at startup. The Cat saved its state to a floppy the same way as > modern day hibernation.) > > Most PC's and modern Macs have had these features since 2000 or so. It > saves you a lot of time not having to reopen everything and everything > is just where you've left it. > That's good to know. I may use the feature when (if) I get a decent battery! > > Who says I waste time whilst booting up or shutting down? I'm usually > > watching TV when I switch it on, and usually going to bed when I shut it > > down - I trundle downstairs for a drink and by the time I return it has shut > > down :) > > > How about the time it takes you to bring up all the apps you had > running, remember which documents you've had opened, and reopen them, etc? > How about the electricity you waste as the machine starts up from > scratch and then sits around and waits for you to come over and relaunch > everything back to where it was before you powered off? > I rarely have many applications open. Maybe 5 at most - Firefox, WinUAE (Amiga emulator), Outlook Express 6, Flash video player (or VLC) and the volume controls. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From dm561 at torfree.net Tue Mar 23 18:59:08 2010 From: dm561 at torfree.net (M H Stein) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 18:59:08 -0500 Subject: Wanted: Graphics card and drive sled for RS/6000 7046-B50 Message-ID: <01CACABA.F5BE55E0@MSE_D03> Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2010 18:04:26 -0600 From: Andrew Warkentin Subject: Wanted: Graphics card and drive sled for RS/6000 7046-B50 >I recently bought an RS/6000 7046-B50. It didn't have a graphics card >installed (I can use it over a serial console, but I would prefer to be >able to use a graphical console). It is also missing the drive sleds. >Does anybody have a graphics card or drive sled that would work with it? ---------- A few days ago I posted here about an RS/6000 available in the Toronto area but there was no interest either here or elsewhere, so it's being scrapped on Thursday. This is an RS/6000 Power Server 520, Type 7013, Model# 26-10855; If it has a graphics card would it fit in yours and what would the number be? And are the sleds compatible? mike From dgahling at hotmail.com Tue Mar 23 18:02:07 2010 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:02:07 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa>, <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com>, <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: I got news for you buddy, your original laptop battery was made in china too! so stop slamming them, all your equipment is made there. as for how long they last, anyone who tells you 8 hours is full of it. maybe 2-3 hours on a good day. unless you're watching videos, or playing games, etc... even then maybe 2 hours. but if the power specs don't line up, yeah, bad idea, no matter where you bought it. there are tricks on the net to deep discharge batteries, and sometimes that brings them back, wipes the ni-cad memory. as for sleep, screen savers, or leave them on.... bzzzzzt... turn them off as much as humanly possible. your system will last longer. My primary pc is now about 8 years old and going strong, never had to replace a thing. I regularly clean out the fans, and the case (dust bunnies, ewww). AND if you're a smoker... well... yer system is hosed... sorry. get a hepa filter in the room, it'll help. Dan. > From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:47:47 +0000 > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Ray Arachelian" > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2010 3:17 PM > Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > > > > Andrew Burton wrote: > > > - Never use sleep/standby, as when I'm finished with my laptop I > usually > > > end up playing videogames, with the games console being powered from the > > > socket that the laptop plug was occupying. > > > > > It still doesn't prevent you from telling your machine to hibernate or > > sleep. > > I suppose not, but.... *see below* (the point about the battery!) > > > > - I let the display go to screen saver, but never use sleep. See > previous > > > point. > > > > > Why? It's much more environmentally friendly to tell the machine to go > > to sleep than it is to run its screen saver. I can understand if you're > > letting it run something in the background that's time consuming - say > > rendering video, or downloading, or backing itself up to an external > > drive, but otherwise, if it's not in use, an idle machine running just a > > screen saver is a waste of electricity, and you're better off telling it > > to sleep or hibernate. > > > > Yes, the screen saver is only running whilst I'm away for a few minutes > (e.g. eating a hot meal) and I'm usually downloading something at the time. > > > > > > On the few occasions it goes to sleep mode (usually just as the internal > > > battery becomes critically low), mine also takes 2 seconds to wake up > (plus > > > a few extra to log back in). > > > > > > > Why not just do that all the time? Explicitly tell the machine to > > hibernate or sleep instead of shutting it down? That way, when you come > > back, everything is as you've left it and you don't need to relaunch > > everything. > > > > Sleep uses very little battery, most machines can sleep for several days > > on a good battery before having to hibernate. I can understand if > > you're low on disk space, you might not want it to hibernate, but that's > > easily solved too, make room by archiving unused files elsewhere. > > > > Now you see theres the other problem. This is an old 2nd-hand laptop and the > internal battery is all but gone - it lasts about 5 minutes after the laptop > as been switched on. When I got it the battery lasted about 40 minutes. > Foolishly, I got a replacement from China. I haven't used the replacement as > i) it looks suspicious too me (and being from China is probably fake/faulty) > and ii) the power ratings on it differ to my official battery and I wouldn't > want anything to happen to my laptop. > So how long does a "good battery" normally last? I know modern laptops can > last up to 8 hours or so (assuming I'm not mis-remembering). > > > > This isn't an new concept. Both the Lisa and the Canon Cat have had it > > back in the early 80's. The Newton had it in the early 90's. I'm sure > > there were others that may have had this feature earlier. > > (The Lisa didn't actually hibernate or sleep, it just remembered the > > state of what documents were opened at shutdown, and simply reopened > > them at startup. The Cat saved its state to a floppy the same way as > > modern day hibernation.) > > > > Most PC's and modern Macs have had these features since 2000 or so. It > > saves you a lot of time not having to reopen everything and everything > > is just where you've left it. > > > > That's good to know. I may use the feature when (if) I get a decent battery! > > > > > Who says I waste time whilst booting up or shutting down? I'm usually > > > watching TV when I switch it on, and usually going to bed when I shut it > > > down - I trundle downstairs for a drink and by the time I return it has > shut > > > down :) > > > > > How about the time it takes you to bring up all the apps you had > > running, remember which documents you've had opened, and reopen them, etc? > > How about the electricity you waste as the machine starts up from > > scratch and then sits around and waits for you to come over and relaunch > > everything back to where it was before you powered off? > > > > I rarely have many applications open. Maybe 5 at most - Firefox, WinUAE > (Amiga emulator), Outlook Express 6, Flash video player (or VLC) and the > volume controls. > > > Regards, > Andrew B > aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk > > _________________________________________________________________ Live connected with Messenger on your phone http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9712958 From teoz at neo.rr.com Tue Mar 23 18:11:26 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:11:26 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com><4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca><017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa><4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa>, <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com>, <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <1059C91E16064DAD8E44FDCFD9C2C8B5@dell8300> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Dan Gahlinger" To: Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2010 7:02 PM Subject: RE: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) Batteries have advanced since your laptop was originally made. Aftermarket batteries use newer cells which seem to last longer (amphours). If the voltage is different or the battery is not an exact fit then I would be worried, but not if the rated amphours is more then the old battery. As others have said all batteries are made in China these days, even OEM ones. Sure there are bad ones out there with marginal cells, but that is the case will all of them. Aftermarket batteries seem to have cheaper electronics inside (some of them anyway). There is a place out in California that will recell your old battery for $55 or so with free shipping if you don't mind it looking a little frankenish (they are welded shut and need cut open and then resealed). Like anything else there are only a few companies making the actual cells anymore (Panasonic and Sanyo come to mind) so you do not have that much choice in quality. From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 18:16:50 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:16:50 -0400 Subject: Wanted: Graphics card and drive sled for RS/6000 7046-B50 In-Reply-To: <01CACABA.F5BE55E0@MSE_D03> References: <01CACABA.F5BE55E0@MSE_D03> Message-ID: <4BA94BE2.3040701@gmail.com> M H Stein wrote: >> I recently bought an RS/6000 7046-B50. It didn't have a graphics card >> installed (I can use it over a serial console, but I would prefer to be >> able to use a graphical console). It is also missing the drive sleds. >> Does anybody have a graphics card or drive sled that would work with it? > > ---------- > A few days ago I posted here about an RS/6000 available in the Toronto > area but there was no interest either here or elsewhere, so it's being > scrapped on Thursday. > > This is an RS/6000 Power Server 520, Type 7013, Model# 26-10855; > If it has a graphics card would it fit in yours and what would the number be? > And are the sleds compatible? Neither would be compatible. Peace... Sridhar From pete at dunnington.plus.com Tue Mar 23 18:59:27 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 23:59:27 +0000 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <4BA8D611.18866.11F6FEC@cclist.sydex.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com>, , <4BA93212.1040106@dunnington.plus.com> <4BA8D611.18866.11F6FEC@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4BA955DF.9070804@dunnington.plus.com> On 23/03/2010 21:54, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 23 Mar 2010 at 21:26, Pete Turnbull wrote: > >> All 3.5" drives spin at 300rpm[1] and don't change the rotational >> speed when switching between DD and HD. > > Ever use much PC98 Japanese gear? They use 3.5" HD floppies that > spin at 360K, just like 5.25" HD and their 8" cousins. It makes a > lot of sense--the format doesn't change, just the physical size of > the medium does. > Most makes of 3.5" drives can be jumpered or switched (although it > may not be documented very well) to run at 360 RPM and some--such as > most USB floppies and Imation Superdrives can detect the recording > density and switch automatically. Interesting -- I'd not come across that, so I've just learned something new. Any easy ones I should look out for? I think I may have a use for that idea. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Tue Mar 23 19:02:51 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 00:02:51 +0000 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <20100323123544.W39356@shell.lmi.net> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com> <4BA8995D.18011.324E8A@cclist.sydex.com> <4BA9090E.8070409@dunnington.plus.com> <575131af1003231158s4d24dd4bi97704cce3c9975cb@mail.gmail.com> <20100323123544.W39356@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BA956AB.3010003@philpem.me.uk> Fred Cisin wrote: > "720K" is 250K bits per second at 300 RPM ("DD diskettes) > (except for some old Sony drives (ask Tony) which ran at 500K/600RPM) ... Drives which are often found in HP 1650 series logic analysers (e.g. my 1651B). Ick. > "2.8M" is 1000K bits per second at 300 RPM ("ED" diskettes > (barium-ferrite, vertical? recording)) Perpendicular recording. Different name, same basic thing. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 23 19:06:17 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:06:17 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa>, <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com>, <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: On Mar 23, 2010, at 7:02 PM, Dan Gahlinger wrote: > as for sleep, screen savers, or leave them on.... bzzzzzt... > > turn them off as much as humanly possible. your system will last > longer. In my experience, on/off cycles kills equipment much faster than long "on" times. > AND if you're a smoker... well... yer system is hosed... sorry. If he's a smoker, a lot more than just his computer is hosed! -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Mar 23 19:10:20 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 18:10:20 -0600 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa>, <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com>, <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <4BA9586C.2030404@jetnet.ab.ca> Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 23, 2010, at 7:02 PM, Dan Gahlinger wrote: >> as for sleep, screen savers, or leave them on.... bzzzzzt... >> >> turn them off as much as humanly possible. your system will last longer. > > In my experience, on/off cycles kills equipment much faster than long > "on" times. > >> AND if you're a smoker... well... yer system is hosed... sorry. > > If he's a smoker, a lot more than just his computer is hosed! And if you are a cat owner ... more warm places for them to curl up on. :) > -Dave Ben... Don't forget the free gifts; like a mouse head on the keyboard. From jfoust at threedee.com Tue Mar 23 19:14:13 2010 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:14:13 -0500 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca> <0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com> <4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <201003240014.o2O0EISH064655@billY.EZWIND.NET> At 07:06 PM 3/23/2010, Dave McGuire wrote: > In my experience, on/off cycles kills equipment much faster than >long "on" times. Is that biased by the experience of failures that appear when equipment is powered-on? One would seem to be shaped by simple MTBF, the other by some sort of electrical or mechanical surge. - John From teoz at neo.rr.com Tue Mar 23 19:27:13 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:27:13 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com><4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca><017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa><4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa><4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com><015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <201003240014.o2O0EISH064655@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <544087B3B7684DD38A112CE31CE219BD@dell8300> ----- Original Message ----- From: "John Foust" To: Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2010 8:14 PM Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > At 07:06 PM 3/23/2010, Dave McGuire wrote: >> In my experience, on/off cycles kills equipment much faster than >>long "on" times. > > > Is that biased by the experience of failures that appear when > equipment is powered-on? > > One would seem to be shaped by simple MTBF, the other by some > sort of electrical or mechanical surge. > > - John > Could be something simple like dirt in the landing zone of the HD head, works fine when running but shut the system down and the head gets stuck. I have had systems that worked with noise coming from circuits with capacitors boiling off that did not work when shut down and turned back on. You also have heat/cooling cycles from turning equipment on and off that snap bad solder joints on parts (especially stuff made around the time they switched to non lead solder). From evan at snarc.net Tue Mar 23 19:54:53 2010 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:54:53 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny Message-ID: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ From starbase89 at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 20:00:02 2010 From: starbase89 at gmail.com (Joe Giliberti) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:00:02 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> Message-ID: <2b1f1f551003231800u7884399o188ac2b37a0d2bae@mail.gmail.com> That's a cool looking machine. I wonder what it is really called... On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 8:54 PM, Evan Koblentz wrote: > > http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ > From starbase89 at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 20:03:57 2010 From: starbase89 at gmail.com (Joe Giliberti) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:03:57 -0400 Subject: IBM 7374 and HP Draftmaster II info needed Message-ID: <2b1f1f551003231803j44b2221pa43040404b45c545@mail.gmail.com> I am trying to dig up information on these two plotters to make them more sellable. They are among the flotsam amassed by Infoage, and just take up space. Thanks Joe From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 23 20:13:56 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 18:13:56 -0700 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <4BA955DF.9070804@dunnington.plus.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com>, <4BA8D611.18866.11F6FEC@cclist.sydex.com>, <4BA955DF.9070804@dunnington.plus.com> Message-ID: <4BA904E4.14129.1D658C0@cclist.sydex.com> On 23 Mar 2010 at 23:59, Pete Turnbull wrote: > Interesting -- I'd not come across that, so I've just learned > something new. Any easy ones I should look out for? I think I may > have a use for that idea. Some Samsung and Mitsubishi drives document "1.6MB support" jumpers, so you'd want that. But if you're like me, I have buckets full of Teac FD235-HF and -HG drives, particularly those with a drive select jumper and nothing else. On these, find the pads labeled S3 and S4. You'll find a 0-ohm SMT resistor installed on S4 and an ohmmeter will show that it's connected to the +5 line. If you check the unpopulated S3 pads next to it (usually), you'll find one is connected to one of the S4 pads and the other is connected to pin 2 of the drive interface header. The usual way of adapting these is to replace the S4 jumper with a 1K SMT resistor and jumper the S3 pads with a 0-ohm resistor. This gives the spindle speed control to pin 2, which is an option if your system uses pin 2 as a density select pin. I usually remove the S4 jumper completely and run a wire between the pad that's not connected to +5 and ground. This hard-configures the 360RPM spindle speed without regard to pin 2. --Chuck From curt at atarimuseum.com Tue Mar 23 20:50:51 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:50:51 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> Message-ID: <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or (looks like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting for $$$ I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and those guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool looking computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference or a Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't know how to market themselves very well. Curt Evan Koblentz wrote: > http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ > > From starbase89 at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 20:53:40 2010 From: starbase89 at gmail.com (Joe Giliberti) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:53:40 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <2b1f1f551003231853q4719f774h58322e9ff4738f7c@mail.gmail.com> You've never heard of The Onion, which is a satirical newspaper that features little, if any truth. On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or (looks > like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting for $$$ > I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C > computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and those > guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool looking > computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference or a > Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging > from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't know > how to market themselves very well. > > > Curt > > > > > Evan Koblentz wrote: > >> >> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >> >> From mwichary at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 20:54:55 2010 From: mwichary at gmail.com (Marcin Wichary) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 18:54:55 -0700 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> For those unfamiliar with The Onion?s style of humour, this is a joke. :) On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or (looks > like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting for $$$ > I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C > computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and those > guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool looking > computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference or a > Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging > from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't know > how to market themselves very well. > > > Curt > > > > > Evan Koblentz wrote: > >> >> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >> >> From starbase89 at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 20:58:07 2010 From: starbase89 at gmail.com (Joe Giliberti) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:58:07 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> The machine in the fake advert looks as though it could have existed at one point On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:54 PM, Marcin Wichary wrote: > For those unfamiliar with The Onion?s style of humour, this is a joke. :) > > On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum > wrote: > > > What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or (looks > > like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting for > $$$ > > I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C > > computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and > those > > guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool > looking > > computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference or > a > > Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging > > from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't > know > > how to market themselves very well. > > > > > > Curt > > > > > > > > > > Evan Koblentz wrote: > > > >> > >> > http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ > >> > >> > From curt at atarimuseum.com Tue Mar 23 21:01:12 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 22:01:12 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <2b1f1f551003231853q4719f774h58322e9ff4738f7c@mail.gmail.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <2b1f1f551003231853q4719f774h58322e9ff4738f7c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BA97268.6070704@atarimuseum.com> Its a small Greenwich Village paper in Manhattan, it has some fun articles from time to time, but its highly slanted and often tends to OpEd more then accurately report things truthfully... it does however have a good backpages area for techjobs and such - or at least it used to. Joe Giliberti wrote: > You've never heard of The Onion, which is a satirical newspaper that > features little, if any truth. > > On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum > wrote: > > >> What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or (looks >> like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting for $$$ >> I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C >> computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and those >> guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool looking >> computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference or a >> Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging >> from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't know >> how to market themselves very well. >> >> >> Curt >> >> >> >> >> Evan Koblentz wrote: >> >> >>> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >>> >>> >>> > > From curt at atarimuseum.com Tue Mar 23 21:02:18 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 22:02:18 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BA972AA.7020509@atarimuseum.com> If it is a joke, it was very convincing... certainly had me going, the machine is pretty cool looking though. Little early for April Fools, isn't it? Joe Giliberti wrote: > The machine in the fake advert looks as though it could have existed at one > point > > On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:54 PM, Marcin Wichary wrote: > > >> For those unfamiliar with The Onion?s style of humour, this is a joke. :) >> >> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum >> wrote: >> >> >>> What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or (looks >>> like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting for >>> >> $$$ >> >>> I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C >>> computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and >>> >> those >> >>> guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool >>> >> looking >> >>> computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference or >>> >> a >> >>> Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging >>> from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't >>> >> know >> >>> how to market themselves very well. >>> >>> >>> Curt >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> Evan Koblentz wrote: >>> >>> >>>> >> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >> >>>> > > From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 21:03:14 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 22:03:14 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA97268.6070704@atarimuseum.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <2b1f1f551003231853q4719f774h58322e9ff4738f7c@mail.gmail.com> <4BA97268.6070704@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <4BA972E2.3050205@gmail.com> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Its a small Greenwich Village paper in Manhattan, it has some fun > articles from time to time, but its highly slanted and often tends to > OpEd more then accurately report things truthfully... it does however > have a good backpages area for techjobs and such - or at least it used to. Uh, no. This is a purely comedic enterprise that originated in Madison, WI. Peace... Sridhar From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 21:03:42 2010 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 22:03:42 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA972AA.7020509@atarimuseum.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <4BA972AA.7020509@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <4BA972FE.7040001@gmail.com> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > If it is a joke, it was very convincing... certainly had me going, the > machine is pretty cool looking though. Little early for April Fools, > isn't it? The entire paper is April Fools. Read some of the other articles. Peace... Sridhar From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Mar 23 21:07:09 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:07:09 -0600 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <2b1f1f551003231853q4719f774h58322e9ff4738f7c@mail.gmail.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <2b1f1f551003231853q4719f774h58322e9ff4738f7c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BA973CD.1070609@jetnet.ab.ca> Joe Giliberti wrote: > You've never heard of The Onion, which is a satirical newspaper that > features little, if any truth. I could pick up any newspaper today to get that, considering for what sells a paper today. Ben. From mwichary at gmail.com Tue Mar 23 21:03:57 2010 From: mwichary at gmail.com (Marcin Wichary) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:03:57 -0700 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA972AA.7020509@atarimuseum.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <4BA972AA.7020509@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <1debc0351003231903m37555e85yc9f1ee0c987d3810@mail.gmail.com> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Onion On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 7:02 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > If it is a joke, it was very convincing... certainly had me going, the > machine is pretty cool looking though. Little early for April Fools, > isn't it? > > > > > Joe Giliberti wrote: > >> The machine in the fake advert looks as though it could have existed at >> one >> point >> >> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:54 PM, Marcin Wichary >> wrote: >> >> >> >>> For those unfamiliar with The Onion?s style of humour, this is a joke. :) >>> >>> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum >>> wrote: >>> >>> >>> >>>> What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or >>>> (looks >>>> like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting for >>>> >>>> >>> $$$ >>> >>> >>>> I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C >>>> computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and >>>> >>>> >>> those >>> >>> >>>> guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool >>>> >>>> >>> looking >>> >>> >>>> computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference or >>>> >>>> >>> a >>> >>> >>>> Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging >>>> from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't >>>> >>>> >>> know >>> >>> >>>> how to market themselves very well. >>>> >>>> >>>> Curt >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> Evan Koblentz wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>> >>> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >>> >>> >>>> >>>>> >>>> >> >> > From teoz at neo.rr.com Tue Mar 23 21:16:49 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 22:16:49 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com><1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com><2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <4BA972AA.7020509@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <77C72A530EFF42CC872FABF3E312EDBF@dell8300> They seem to have a decent budget for props/photoshop work. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Curt @ Atari Museum" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2010 10:02 PM Subject: Re: Laugh, it's funny > If it is a joke, it was very convincing... certainly had me going, the > machine is pretty cool looking though. Little early for April Fools, > isn't it? > > > > Joe Giliberti wrote: >> The machine in the fake advert looks as though it could have existed at >> one >> point >> >> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:54 PM, Marcin Wichary >> wrote: >> >> >>> For those unfamiliar with The Onion?s style of humour, this is a joke. >>> :) >>> >>> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum >>> wrote: >>> >>> >>>> What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or >>>> (looks >>>> like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting >>>> for >>>> >>> $$$ >>> >>>> I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C >>>> computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and >>>> >>> those >>> >>>> guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool >>>> >>> looking >>> >>>> computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference >>>> or >>>> >>> a >>> >>>> Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. >>>> Judging >>>> from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't >>>> >>> know >>> >>>> how to market themselves very well. >>>> >>>> >>>> Curt >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> Evan Koblentz wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>>> >>> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >>> >>>>> >> >> From als at thangorodrim.de Tue Mar 23 21:23:28 2010 From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 03:23:28 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca> <0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com> <4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <20100324022328.GA22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 07:02:07PM -0400, Dan Gahlinger wrote: > > I got news for you buddy, > > your original laptop battery was made in china too! > so stop slamming them, all your equipment is made there. Oh yes, a look at the "Made in ..." notices can be quite enlightening. > as for how long they last, anyone who tells you 8 hours is full of it. > maybe 2-3 hours on a good day. Depends very much on laptop and battery. The Thinkpad X200 with the extended battery here is easily good for 6 hours playing video. > unless you're watching videos, or playing games, etc... even then maybe 2 hours. > > but if the power specs don't line up, yeah, bad idea, no matter where you bought it. > > there are tricks on the net to deep discharge batteries, and sometimes that brings them back, > wipes the ni-cad memory. You have to go back quite a few years in time to find NiCd chemistry in laptop batteries. Anything designed in the last several years is some kind of Lithium based (LiIon, LiPoly, ...) battery chemistry. And that doesn't like deep discharge at all - deep discharging Li-based batteries is one of the more reliable ways to kill them. Regards, Alex. From dgahling at hotmail.com Tue Mar 23 21:32:03 2010 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 22:32:03 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <1059C91E16064DAD8E44FDCFD9C2C8B5@dell8300> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com><4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca><017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa><4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa>, , <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com>, , <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa>, , <1059C91E16064DAD8E44FDCFD9C2C8B5@dell8300> Message-ID: Tell that to my 2 month old Dell D630 battery lasts about 2 hours if I watch movies on it... then again, Dell isnt exactly known for quality. > From: teoz at neo.rr.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:11:26 -0400 > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Dan Gahlinger" > To: > Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2010 7:02 PM > Subject: RE: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > > > > Batteries have advanced since your laptop was originally made. Aftermarket > batteries use newer cells which seem to last longer (amphours). If the > voltage is different or the battery is not an exact fit then I would be > worried, but not if the rated amphours is more then the old battery. > > As others have said all batteries are made in China these days, even OEM > ones. Sure there are bad ones out there with marginal cells, but that is the > case will all of them. Aftermarket batteries seem to have cheaper > electronics inside (some of them anyway). > > There is a place out in California that will recell your old battery for $55 > or so with free shipping if you don't mind it looking a little frankenish > (they are welded shut and need cut open and then resealed). > > Like anything else there are only a few companies making the actual cells > anymore (Panasonic and Sanyo come to mind) so you do not have that much > choice in quality. > _________________________________________________________________ Stay in touch. http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9712959 From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Tue Mar 23 21:58:31 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:58:31 -0500 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <77C72A530EFF42CC872FABF3E312EDBF@dell8300> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net>, <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com><1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com><2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com>, <4BA972AA.7020509@atarimuseum.com>, <77C72A530EFF42CC872FABF3E312EDBF@dell8300> Message-ID: Marcin, I agree. This group can be dumber than a stick at times. They will never get it. Randy > From: teoz at neo.rr.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: Laugh, it's funny > Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 22:16:49 -0400 > > They seem to have a decent budget for props/photoshop work. > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Curt @ Atari Museum" > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2010 10:02 PM > Subject: Re: Laugh, it's funny > > > > If it is a joke, it was very convincing... certainly had me going, the > > machine is pretty cool looking though. Little early for April Fools, > > isn't it? > > > > > > > > Joe Giliberti wrote: > >> The machine in the fake advert looks as though it could have existed at > >> one > >> point > >> > >> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:54 PM, Marcin Wichary > >> wrote: > >> > >> > >>> For those unfamiliar with The Onion?s style of humour, this is a joke. > >>> :) > >>> > >>> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum > >>> wrote: > >>> > >>> > >>>> What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or > >>>> (looks > >>>> like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting > >>>> for > >>>> > >>> $$$ > >>> > >>>> I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C > >>>> computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and > >>>> > >>> those > >>> > >>>> guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool > >>>> > >>> looking > >>> > >>>> computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference > >>>> or > >>>> > >>> a > >>> > >>>> Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. > >>>> Judging > >>>> from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't > >>>> > >>> know > >>> > >>>> how to market themselves very well. > >>>> > >>>> > >>>> Curt > >>>> > >>>> > >>>> > >>>> > >>>> Evan Koblentz wrote: > >>>> > >>>> > >>>>> > >>> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ > >>> > >>>>> > >> > >> > _________________________________________________________________ The New Busy is not the old busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_3 From als at thangorodrim.de Tue Mar 23 21:45:33 2010 From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 03:45:33 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <201003240014.o2O0EISH064655@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <201003240014.o2O0EISH064655@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 07:14:13PM -0500, John Foust wrote: > At 07:06 PM 3/23/2010, Dave McGuire wrote: > > In my experience, on/off cycles kills equipment much faster than > >long "on" times. > > > Is that biased by the experience of failures that appear when > equipment is powered-on? > > One would seem to be shaped by simple MTBF, Most electronics these days have a pretty large MTBF - usually, by the time you get anywhere near a significant fraction of the MTBF the equipment is long obsolete anyway. For instance, one of the hard drives in my machines has a MTBF of 1.2 _million_ hours, that's about 136 years. Yes, I expect it to actually fail a bit sooner (it is a MTBF and not a guarantee, after all), but I don't expect the drive to be in service in 5 years due to being replaced by a larger one. As it happens, the manufacturer actually gives 5 years of warranty for that one ... > the other by some > sort of electrical or mechanical surge. There are several things that kill machines on powerup, among them - electrical surges - thermal changes - for hard drives, especially older ones running for a long time, stiction (having the heads stick to the platters) - running out of power cycles The last one is/was an issue for laptop drives, as they are specified only for a limited number of powercycles. With very aggressive power management shutting them down/powering them up every few minutes, that number isn't as large as one might think. Regards, Alex. -- "Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." -- Thomas A. Edison From geneb at deltasoft.com Tue Mar 23 22:01:57 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:01:57 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or (looks > like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting for $$$ > I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C > computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and those > guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool looking > computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference or a > Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging from > that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't know how to > market themselves very well. > > > Curt > Uhhhh. Curt, have you spent any time reading The Onion? g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From geneb at deltasoft.com Tue Mar 23 22:04:55 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:04:55 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA97268.6070704@atarimuseum.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <2b1f1f551003231853q4719f774h58322e9ff4738f7c@mail.gmail.com> <4BA97268.6070704@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 23 Mar 2010, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Its a small Greenwich Village paper in Manhattan, it has some fun articles > from time to time, but its highly slanted and often tends to OpEd more then > accurately report things truthfully... it does however have a good > backpages area for techjobs and such - or at least it used to. > Curt, for as long as I've known about it (10+ years) it's NEVER published factual news stories. It's ALL fake. Take a look for a book called "Our Dumb Century". Insanely great stuff. This was my introduction to The Onion: http://www.theonion.com/articles/clinton-deploys-very-special-forces-to-iraq,645/ g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 23 22:18:43 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 23:18:43 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <201003240014.o2O0EISH064655@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca> <0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com> <4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <201003240014.o2O0EISH064655@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: On Mar 23, 2010, at 8:14 PM, John Foust wrote: >> In my experience, on/off cycles kills equipment much faster than >> long "on" times. > > Is that biased by the experience of failures that appear when > equipment is powered-on? I haven't really had very many of those. > One would seem to be shaped by simple MTBF, the other by some > sort of electrical or mechanical surge. The other has a lot to do with thermal expansion and contraction, and the resultant simple physical fatigue. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 23 22:18:44 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:18:44 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100324022328.GA22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> References: <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca>, , <20100324022328.GA22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> Message-ID: <4BA92224.4522.2489AB1@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Mar 2010 at 3:23, Alexander Schreiber wrote: > You have to go back quite a few years in time to find NiCd chemistry > in laptop batteries. Anything designed in the last several years is > some kind of Lithium based (LiIon, LiPoly, ...) battery chemistry. Does that fall into the "nothing good in the last 20 years" claim? --Chuck From IanK at vulcan.com Tue Mar 23 22:58:49 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:58:49 -0700 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA972AA.7020509@atarimuseum.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com>, <4BA972AA.7020509@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: For The Onion, April never stops. Specifically, April 1. ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Curt @ Atari Museum [curt at atarimuseum.com] Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2010 7:02 PM To: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Laugh, it's funny If it is a joke, it was very convincing... certainly had me going, the machine is pretty cool looking though. Little early for April Fools, isn't it? Joe Giliberti wrote: > The machine in the fake advert looks as though it could have existed at one > point > > On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:54 PM, Marcin Wichary wrote: > > >> For those unfamiliar with The Onion?s style of humour, this is a joke. :) >> >> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum >> wrote: >> >> >>> What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or (looks >>> like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting for >>> >> $$$ >> >>> I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C >>> computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and >>> >> those >> >>> guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool >>> >> looking >> >>> computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference or >>> >> a >> >>> Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging >>> from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't >>> >> know >> >>> how to market themselves very well. >>> >>> >>> Curt >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> Evan Koblentz wrote: >>> >>> >>>> >> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >> >>>> > > From spectre at floodgap.com Tue Mar 23 23:05:32 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 21:05:32 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: from Gene Buckle at "Mar 23, 10 08:04:55 pm" Message-ID: <201003240405.o2O45WSb007850@floodgap.com> > Curt, for as long as I've known about it (10+ years) it's NEVER published > factual news stories. It's ALL fake. Take a look for a book called "Our > Dumb Century". Insanely great stuff. MAN WALKS ON THE #$%&ING MOON ObCC: There is also a priceless article with the TI 99/4A in there. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Conscience makes egotists of us all. -- Oscar Wilde ------------------------ From dm561 at torfree.net Wed Mar 24 04:46:25 2010 From: dm561 at torfree.net (M H Stein) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 04:46:25 -0500 Subject: Wanted: Graphics card and drive sled for RS/6000 7046-B50 Message-ID: <01CACB0D.09B5C040@MSE_D03> Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:16:50 -0400 From: Sridhar Ayengar Subject: Re: Wanted: Graphics card and drive sled for RS/6000 7046-B50 M H Stein wrote: >> I recently bought an RS/6000 7046-B50. It didn't have a graphics card >> installed (I can use it over a serial console, but I would prefer to be >> able to use a graphical console). It is also missing the drive sleds. >> Does anybody have a graphics card or drive sled that would work with it? > > ---------- > A few days ago I posted here about an RS/6000 available in the Toronto > area but there was no interest either here or elsewhere, so it's being > scrapped on Thursday. > > This is an RS/6000 Power Server 520, Type 7013, Model# 26-10855; > If it has a graphics card would it fit in yours and what would the number be? > And are the sleds compatible? Neither would be compatible. Peace... Sridhar ------------------------------ Thanks for that info, Sridhar; I googled the 7046 and yes, it looks like it's at least ten years newer than mine which I think is one of the very first RS/6000s, and a completely different machine; too bad. mike From nico at farumdata.dk Wed Mar 24 03:58:53 2010 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:58:53 +0100 Subject: Talking of old IBM systems References: <01CACB0D.09B5C040@MSE_D03> Message-ID: Reading a thread on old RS/6000's, I came to think of something I heard in the 80's or thereabouts. It was said, that decommissioned 360's were dumped in the Atlantic, to prevent that they fell in the hands of the OEM manufacturers. Is there any truth in this statement? From theodric at gmail.com Wed Mar 24 05:36:18 2010 From: theodric at gmail.com (Jeremy S. Sharp) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 11:36:18 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) Message-ID: <25D81406-4F6F-4D0A-B19E-0CE5A5352FDF@gmail.com> > Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:14:13 -0500 > From: John Foust > Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news > update) > To: > Message-ID: <201003240014.o2O0EISH064655 at billY.EZWIND.NET> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > > At 07:06 PM 3/23/2010, Dave McGuire wrote: >> In my experience, on/off cycles kills equipment much faster than >> long "on" times. > > Is that biased by the experience of failures that appear when > equipment is powered-on? I offer you this unscientific anecdote: Yesterday, I rebooted an older Xeon box with 42 days' uptime to apply updates, but it decided it didn't want to come back up afterward: no POST, subsequent poweroff. I troubleshot briefly, and determined that after working perfectly for over a month at a stretch (and 4 years before that), it now refuses to POST unless you have half - any half - of the RAM in the first two slots. No obvious signs of magic smoke leakage. Coincidence? I suppose it's possible. I kinda wish I'd just kept the old kernel, in any event. But with the price of energy in the Netherlands, I wouldn't leave a system like that powered on for any length of time if my employer weren't footing the bill for it! Is there anybody here who keeps classic big(-ish) iron running 24x7? I've been told a story of a burning PDP-11/34 which has somewhat put me off any notion of leaving my -8s turned on when I'm not within reach of a killswitch & fire extinguisher. :) -js From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Mar 24 07:34:43 2010 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 07:34:43 -0500 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <77C72A530EFF42CC872FABF3E312EDBF@dell8300> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com><1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com><2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <4BA972AA.7020509@atarimuseum.com> <77C72A530EFF42CC872FABF3E312EDBF@dell8300> Message-ID: <4BAA06E3.4030507@gmail.com> was yesterday international top-posting day or something? ;-) Teo Zenios wrote: > They seem to have a decent budget for props/photoshop work. > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Curt @ Atari Museum" > > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2010 10:02 PM > Subject: Re: Laugh, it's funny > > >> If it is a joke, it was very convincing... certainly had me going, the >> machine is pretty cool looking though. Little early for April >> Fools, isn't it? >> >> >> >> Joe Giliberti wrote: >>> The machine in the fake advert looks as though it could have existed >>> at one >>> point >>> >>> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:54 PM, Marcin Wichary >>> wrote: >>> >>> >>>> For those unfamiliar with The Onion's style of humour, this is a >>>> joke. :) >>>> >>>> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum >>>> wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>>> What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or >>>>> (looks >>>>> like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are >>>>> hurting for >>>>> >>>> $$$ >>>> >>>>> I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C >>>>> computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and >>>>> >>>> those >>>> >>>>> guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool >>>>> >>>> looking >>>> >>>>> computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY >>>>> reference or >>>>> >>>> a >>>> >>>>> Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging >>>>> from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't >>>>> >>>> know >>>> >>>>> how to market themselves very well. >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Curt >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Evan Koblentz wrote: >>>>> >>>>> >>>>>> >>>> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >>>> >>>> >>>>>> >>> >>> > > From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 24 08:21:44 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 13:21:44 +0000 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: , <746B553C-2BC8-498C-9220-5A1B00F7458F@neurotica.com> <4BA8D32E.28377.114278E@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4BAA11E8.7080307@philpem.me.uk> Dave McGuire wrote: > Further, one > can design an mcs51-based chip without paying a dime to anyone...can't > exactly do that with ARM. As I understand it, you can design a MIPS chip based on the published specs and not have to pay any licensing fees. There was a patent on the unaligned load/store instructions, but that expired in 2006 AIUI. The same could probably be said about m68k, but I'm not entirely sure I'd /want/ to clone the 68K unless I wanted to do an Amiga or Atari ST reimplementation of some kind (yes, I know about Minimig and Suska, I've had the Suska WD1772 HDL running on the DiscFerret). My current "Super Fun Evening Project" is to get a MIPS32r2 core running on my Altera DE1 development board, just for fun. Then I plan to kit it out with an LCD driver (framebuffer type) and make it run MIPSLinux (or at least U-Boot and one of the free RTOSes, e.g. eCos or RTEMS). Then the icing on the cake... make it drive a basic logic analyser. It's a bit of fun at least :) It is for this reason that I've borrowed a copy of "See MIPS Run" (by D. Sweetman) from the university library.... and a copy of "The 68000 Microprocessor" (3ed by J. L. Antonakos) just for grins :) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From billdeg at degnanco.com Wed Mar 24 08:42:57 2010 From: billdeg at degnanco.com (B Degnan) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:42:57 -0400 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double image Message-ID: <4BAA16E1.9070503@degnanco.com> I am working with an IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card that is showing a double image. I noticed that the 106 / 16+ tant cap at the top left near where C1 / U47 is printed was broken off the board so I put in a new one. There was no change. I tried another cap, no change. I removed the cap entirely, no change. I am looking for a schematic/docs/suggestions. It looks something like this: ------------------------------------------------- -128K 128K - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ------------------------------------------------- Thanks. From keithvz at verizon.net Wed Mar 24 08:55:33 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:55:33 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <4BAA19D5.7010004@verizon.net> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or > (looks like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are > hurting for $$$ I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of > their X-117C computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy > those up and those guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is > a damned cool looking computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't > find ANY reference or a Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one > until today. Judging from that alone, looks like these guys biggest > problem is they didn't know how to market themselves very well. > > > Curt > > > > Evan Koblentz wrote: >> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >> >> Sorry Curt if this is at your expense, but it's responses like yours that make the onion so funny. At first, I thought you were furthering the joke along --- which would have also been funny, if that was truly the case. (from the subsequent replies, I don't think so.) hahaha. Keith From curt at atarimuseum.com Wed Mar 24 09:06:52 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 10:06:52 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BAA19D5.7010004@verizon.net> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <4BAA19D5.7010004@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4BAA1C7C.4020702@atarimuseum.com> Nope, I got caught on this one - I was fooled... Keith wrote: > Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: >> What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or >> (looks like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are >> hurting for $$$ I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any >> of their X-117C computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help >> buy those up and those guys would make a few bucks, I for one think >> that is a damned cool looking computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M >> box... I can't find ANY reference or a Xalaga computer anywhere, and >> never heard of one until today. Judging from that alone, looks >> like these guys biggest problem is they didn't know how to market >> themselves very well. >> >> >> Curt >> >> >> >> Evan Koblentz wrote: >>> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >>> >>> > > Sorry Curt if this is at your expense, but it's responses like yours > that make the onion so funny. > > At first, I thought you were furthering the joke along --- which would > have also been funny, if that was truly the case. (from the > subsequent replies, I don't think so.) > > hahaha. > > Keith > > From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 24 09:08:40 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 14:08:40 +0000 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double image In-Reply-To: <4BAA16E1.9070503@degnanco.com> References: <4BAA16E1.9070503@degnanco.com> Message-ID: <4BAA1CE8.5030100@philpem.me.uk> B Degnan wrote: > It looks something like this: > > ------------------------------------------------- > -128K 128K - > - - > - - > - - > - - > - - > - - > - - > ------------------------------------------------- I'd be looking for a stuck address bit, or possibly a failed RAM chip (it's theoretically possible for an ESD-protection diode in a CMOS chip to fail shorted, which would effectively pull that signal line high or low). If I had a circuit diagram I could probably tell you which parts / pins to test, but either way you'll need a good logic probe (one that has a pulse detector in addition to the hi/lo comparators) or an oscilloscope to pin down the fault. My money's on a 74xx chip (possibly a counter, buffer or multiplexer) that's had an output fail open. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From blstuart at bellsouth.net Wed Mar 24 09:16:32 2010 From: blstuart at bellsouth.net (blstuart at bellsouth.net) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:16:32 -0500 Subject: Talking of old IBM systems In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <8d8b0a5c9c4f2a345e990485f6059cb4@bellsouth.net> > Reading a thread on old RS/6000's, I came to think of something I heard in > the 80's or thereabouts. > It was said, that decommissioned 360's were dumped in the Atlantic, to > prevent that they fell in the hands of the OEM manufacturers. > Is there any truth in this statement? I don't know about the ocean, but they did send them off to scrap yards and stuff to be demolished. I had a roommate in college who had worked at one of these places in high school and he had one of the 360 nameplates as a souvenir. And there was more than just OEMs to consider. Back then they'd lease you their grandmother but not sell much of anything. So when something went off lease and they had a new model, most customers were "gently" encouraged to lease the new one and IBM would pull the old one. So what to do with the old ones? Well, you can guess. Certainly couldn't have the older model in the used market to cut into leases on the new one... BLS From nico at farumdata.dk Wed Mar 24 09:55:37 2010 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:55:37 +0100 Subject: Talking of old IBM systems References: <8d8b0a5c9c4f2a345e990485f6059cb4@bellsouth.net> Message-ID: <6B144625CD394CBC956CDB1E49672F7B@udvikling> Subject: Re: Talking of old IBM systems >> Reading a thread on old RS/6000's, I came to think of something I heard >> in >> the 80's or thereabouts. >> It was said, that decommissioned 360's were dumped in the Atlantic, to >> prevent that they fell in the hands of the OEM manufacturers. >> Is there any truth in this statement? > > I don't know about the ocean, but they did send them off to > scrap yards and stuff to be demolished. I had a roommate in > college who had worked at one of these places in high school > and he had one of the 360 nameplates as a souvenir. And there > was more than just OEMs to consider. Back then they'd lease > you their grandmother but not sell much of anything. So > when something went off lease and they had a new model, > most customers were "gently" encouraged to lease the new > one and IBM would pull the old one. So what to do with > the old ones? Well, you can guess. Certainly couldn't have > the older model in the used market to cut into leases on > the new one... > Ah yes, the lease problem. I had forgotten about that one. Nice folklore : shortly after I canged jobs, the new place got a new leased 2540 http://www.columbia.edu/acis/history/2540.html When I opened it up, I got quite astonished, as it was the exact same 2540 I had used in my old job. How I could tell ? My pack of cards was in the door pocket ! And the 2540 was supposed to be new. They hadnt even cleared out old confetti! Another place I was some years later, the 360/25 was to be replaced with a 370/125 (IIRC). So, friday afternoon the technician came, dismantled everything, and saturday morning the movers came, to cart the system into oblivion (I suppose). When the (other) movers were supposed to come with the 125, nothing happened. Panicking telephone calls, shouting, etc. Then a telephonecall came, saying that the 125 had unexplicably been routed to Paris, and they didnt know when it could come. Call to the first move, who hadnt yet unloaded the truck. He came back, the technician assembled the system again (I forgot to tell that the machine room was on the first floor), and he went home sunday morning. MOnday we got a call, that the system would arrive tuesday. Now the technician waited til the new system was in the yard, before he started to disassemble the /25. I didnt accomplish much that week. Nico From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Mar 24 09:58:19 2010 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 07:58:19 -0700 (PDT) Subject: MIPS was Re: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BAA11E8.7080307@philpem.me.uk> from Philip Pemberton at "Mar 24, 10 01:21:44 pm" Message-ID: <201003241458.o2OEwJBW014880@floodgap.com> > > Further, one > > can design an mcs51-based chip without paying a dime to anyone...can't > > exactly do that with ARM. > > As I understand it, you can design a MIPS chip based on the published > specs and not have to pay any licensing fees. There was a patent on the > unaligned load/store instructions, but that expired in 2006 AIUI. That's probably why the Chinese have jumped on it (Godson/Loongson), not that they worry excessively about licensing, but anyway. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- If your happiness depends on anyone else, you've got a problem. -- R. Bach - From lproven at gmail.com Wed Mar 24 10:17:05 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:17:05 +0000 Subject: MIPS was Re: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <201003241458.o2OEwJBW014880@floodgap.com> References: <4BAA11E8.7080307@philpem.me.uk> <201003241458.o2OEwJBW014880@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003240817y4e272d64re6abccfbb9f7557a@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Mar 24, 2010 at 2:58 PM, Cameron Kaiser wrote: >> > Further, one >> > can design an mcs51-based chip without paying a dime to anyone...can't >> > exactly do that with ARM. >> >> As I understand it, you can design a MIPS chip based on the published >> specs and not have to pay any licensing fees. There was a patent on the >> unaligned load/store instructions, but that expired in 2006 AIUI. > > That's probably why the Chinese have jumped on it (Godson/Loongson), not > that they worry excessively about licensing, but anyway. Indeed. Not for domestic use, they don't, anyway. But they *do* care about stuff they want to sell abroad... :?) -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 24 10:30:51 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 08:30:51 -0700 Subject: Talking of old IBM systems In-Reply-To: <8d8b0a5c9c4f2a345e990485f6059cb4@bellsouth.net> References: , <8d8b0a5c9c4f2a345e990485f6059cb4@bellsouth.net> Message-ID: <4BA9CDBB.29681.A36ED@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Mar 2010 at 9:16, blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: > I don't know about the ocean, but they did send them off to > scrap yards and stuff to be demolished. I had a roommate in > college who had worked at one of these places in high school > and he had one of the 360 nameplates as a souvenir. And there > was more than just OEMs to consider. Back then they'd lease > you their grandmother but not sell much of anything. So > when something went off lease and they had a new model, > most customers were "gently" encouraged to lease the new > one and IBM would pull the old one. So what to do with > the old ones? Well, you can guess. Certainly couldn't have > the older model in the used market to cut into leases on > the new one... There's another aspect to the problem, that CDC ran into during the 70's--that of used parts finding their way into the mainstream. Apparently, this was enough of a problem that CDC ordered that any decommissioned system be reduced to unusable junk. At SVLOPS I saw CEs spend hours taking bolt cutters and hammers to disk drives and one-of-a-kind systems (STAR 1-Bs) after stripping useful bits from them. It hur to watch. --Chuck From ray at arachelian.com Wed Mar 24 10:41:55 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 11:41:55 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <4BAA32C3.5050102@arachelian.com> Andrew Burton wrote: > Now you see theres the other problem. This is an old 2nd-hand laptop and the > internal battery is all but gone - it lasts about 5 minutes after the laptop > as been switched on. When I got it the battery lasted about 40 minutes. > Foolishly, I got a replacement from China. I haven't used the replacement as > i) it looks suspicious too me (and being from China is probably fake/faulty) > and ii) the power ratings on it differ to my official battery and I wouldn't > want anything to happen to my laptop. > You could have mentioned this earlier and saved a lot of messages. :) > So how long does a "good battery" normally last? I know modern laptops can > last up to 8 hours or so (assuming I'm not mis-remembering). > I remember older ones were about 2 hours or so. Depends on what kind of notebook. You could google the original specs, it should tell you what the battery life was like. Meanwhile you could experiment and see how long it can sleep for before it runs out or starts to hibernate. Still, there shouldn't be anything preventing you from using the hibernate feature as long as you've got enough disk space (and it has the feature, and enable it - if I remember, with some flavors of that odd OS from Redmond, you have to explicitly turn on a switch to enable it.) If the voltage ratings are the same, and the pins for the battery are the same and it fits, there's no reason not to try it. It might have a larger capacity than the original. Just make sure the voltage is the same. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 24 11:05:48 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 12:05:48 -0400 Subject: Scrapping and re-use (was Re: Talking of old IBM systems) Message-ID: On Wed, Mar 24, 2010 at 11:30 AM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 24 Mar 2010 at 9:16, blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: > >> I don't know about the ocean, but they did send them off to >> scrap yards and stuff to be demolished... > > There's another aspect to the problem, that CDC ran into during the > 70's--that of used parts finding their way into the mainstream. > Apparently, this was enough of a problem that CDC ordered that any > decommissioned system be reduced to unusable junk... DEC had a problem in the 1980s with parts and machines that had been scrapped ending back in the sales stream. The big problems for them were maintaining the perception of quality (much of what got scrapped had failed some aspect of the testing process) and the tax issue of claiming that an item was scrapped but still out in the world. I was told one source of this was the recyclers picking through the bins of scrap coming from DEC and reselling things that were deemed resellable. They were paying by the pound for precious and ferrous metal scrap but making much more from the occasional gem. As the story goes, DEC bought a large shredder (large enough to accept 19" racks!), ensuring that re-use would not be feasible. We had a similar issue at Software Results - obsolete (prototypes and Rev 0 boards) and unrepairable boards were lying around after they'd been scrapped - we couldn't repair them since they'd been written off, so since they were large and green (because of the solder mask), one of our student employees nailed a bunch of them to a wooden frame in an irregular isosceles triangle pattern and made a "COMBOARD Christmas Tree" (using 9-track write rings as ornaments and tractor-feed tearoffs as garlands). Because the boards were rendered more unusable (as computer peripherals) by drilling nail holes in them, it was considered an acceptable re-use. I wish I had a picture of it still. -ethan From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Mar 24 11:53:02 2010 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:53:02 -0700 Subject: Scrapping and re-use (was Re: Talking of old IBM systems) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: At 12:05 PM -0400 3/24/10, Ethan Dicks wrote: >so since they were large and green (because of the solder mask), one >of our student employees nailed a bunch of them to a wooden frame in >an irregular isosceles triangle pattern and made a "COMBOARD Christmas >Tree" (using 9-track write rings as ornaments and tractor-feed >tearoffs as garlands). Because the boards were rendered more unusable >(as computer peripherals) by drilling nail holes in them, it was >considered an acceptable re-use. I wish I had a picture of it still. The mainframe site that I worked at in the Navy in the early 90's took disk packs after degassing them and disassembled them for the platters. When someone transferred to another command everyone would engrave a message onto the platter, and it would get framed, and given to that person. I still have mine, though I'm not sure where in the garage it is. :-) Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | 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 billdeg at degnanco.com Wed Mar 24 12:01:52 2010 From: billdeg at degnanco.com (B Degnan) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 13:01:52 -0400 Subject: The Oldest Toshiba Laptop in Portugal Message-ID: <4BAA4580.3050002@degnanco.com> There's a contest with a prize of a new Toshiba laptop that goes to the person with the oldest working Toshiba laptop: http://www.facebook.com/toshibaportugal?v=app_7146470109 (it's in Portuguese). You must be a Portuguese citizen. Bill From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Wed Mar 24 12:11:48 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 10:11:48 -0700 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double image References: <4BAA16E1.9070503@degnanco.com> Message-ID: <4BAA47D5.6E89967E@cs.ubc.ca> B Degnan wrote: > > I am working with an IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card that > is showing a double image. I noticed that the 106 / 16+ tant cap at the > top left near where C1 / U47 is printed was broken off the board so I > put in a new one. There was no change. I tried another cap, no > change. I removed the cap entirely, no change. I am looking for a > schematic/docs/suggestions. That would be a 10,000,000 pF = 10 uF / 16V cap, in all likelihood just a local power supply filter cap. > It looks something like this: > > ------------------------------------------------- > -128K 128K - > - - > - - > - - > - - > - - > - - > - - > ------------------------------------------------- Along with Phil's suggestion of memory addressing issues resulting in a double-scan of the memory, the staggering of the images suggests interlacing might be occurring when it shouldn't be. Sometimes it is possible to tweak the V/H-hold controls enough on monitors to end up with interlacing occurring when it shouldn't. Can you discern whether each of the scan images contains a full set of lines vs half the number of lines? I hate to ask, but what sort of monitor is this being displayed on? IIRC the scan rate for MDA was higher than NTSC and I'm not not sure whether an NTSC monitor would sync up or sync down to half the scan rate. From arcarlini at iee.org Wed Mar 24 13:21:41 2010 From: arcarlini at iee.org (arcarlini at iee.org) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 18:21:41 -0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> Message-ID: <6797290367374D76906836B0E2F68348@ANTONIOPC> Alexander Schreiber [als at thangorodrim.de] wrote: > Most electronics these days have a pretty large MTBF - > usually, by the time you get anywhere near a significant > fraction of the MTBF the equipment is long obsolete anyway. > For instance, one of the hard drives in my machines has a > MTBF of 1.2 _million_ hours, that's about 136 years. Yes, I > expect it to actually fail a bit sooner (it is a MTBF and not > a guarantee, after all), but I don't expect the drive to be > in service in 5 years due to being replaced by a larger one. > As it happens, the manufacturer actually gives 5 years of > warranty for that one ... MTBF doesn't mean what you think it means. It means if you have a bank of (say) 1000 such drives and **you swap them for new ones every time their pass their service life (5 years in your case) _then_ you'll experience MTBF/num-drives failures every year, on average**. So if you don't swap your drives out every time they go out of warranty, the MTBF you'll experience is not the MTBF they've quoted. Clearly an MTBF of that long should mean that it's unlikely that you'll experience a dead drive in the first five years that you own it. So just two dead ones in the office last week ... I must be lucky :-) Antonio From pete at dunnington.plus.com Wed Mar 24 13:14:40 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 18:14:40 +0000 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <4BA904E4.14129.1D658C0@cclist.sydex.com> References: <575131af1003230544t691137avcddc737630f96809@mail.gmail.com>, <4BA8D611.18866.11F6FEC@cclist.sydex.com>, <4BA955DF.9070804@dunnington.plus.com> <4BA904E4.14129.1D658C0@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4BAA5690.2030200@dunnington.plus.com> On 24/03/2010 01:13, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 23 Mar 2010 at 23:59, Pete Turnbull wrote: > >> Interesting -- I'd not come across that, so I've just learned >> something new. Any easy ones I should look out for? I think I may >> have a use for that idea. > But if you're like me, I have buckets full of Teac FD235-HF and -HG Yes :-) > The usual way of adapting these is to replace the S4 jumper with a 1K > SMT resistor and jumper the S3 pads with a 0-ohm resistor. Thanks for that -- I'm sure I'll find a use for it! -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From brad at heeltoe.com Wed Mar 24 13:31:08 2010 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 14:31:08 -0400 Subject: Async logic In-Reply-To: <1e33cf55b039635cd92de12669c6237c.squirrel@webmail.prismnet.com> (sfid-20100323_132838_970008_2B48C361) References: <1e33cf55b039635cd92de12669c6237c.squirrel@webmail.prismnet.com> (sfid-20100323_132838_970008_2B48C361) Message-ID: <4E191DF0-7F1B-456F-AC0F-CDFB919721CF@heeltoe.com> On Mar 23, 2010, at 1:26 PM, Jeff Walther wrote: > > The amount of design discipline needed was substantial, making me wonder That was my point. I would steer any one new to logic design away from async logic. It's very interesting, and fun, but not something for the newly initiated. -brad Brad Parker Heeltoe Consulting 781-483-3101 http://www.heeltoe.com From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 24 14:01:51 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:01:51 -0400 Subject: Async logic In-Reply-To: <4BA7DBFA.8BE5CCD@cs.ubc.ca> References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> <4B99458B.6000409@philpem.me.uk> (sfid-20100311_145056_600573_5F1B2CDD) <4BA4F363.8050201@verizon.net> (sfid-20100320_121316_167231_4007BDBF) <4BA64CC5.1030005@heeltoe.com> <4BA7DBFA.8BE5CCD@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: On Mar 22, 2010, at 5:07 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote: > I dealt with a reasonably complex async-design logic system from > the 60's in > reverse-engineering and repairing a Casio AL-1000 calculator: > http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~hilpert/eec/misc/CasioAL1000Tech/index.html > and in particular: > http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~hilpert/eec/misc/CasioAL1000Tech/ > electronics.html#edgepulse > What I call 'edge-pulse gates' - a sort of monostable - are > injected into the > logic at appropriate places to soak up the glitches (one would have > to look at > the schematic to see where/how they are actually used). Wow. I am impressed. That's one of the most detailed and well- presented reverse-engineering projects I've ever seen. And I had no idea that a four-function calculator could be SO COOL! :) -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 24 14:41:50 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:41:50 -0400 Subject: Async logic In-Reply-To: References: <4B9543B5.6030408@verizon.net> <4B964120.7000103@philpem.me.uk> <4B992F2F.6040102@verizon.net> <4B99458B.6000409@philpem.me.uk> <4BA4F363.8050201@verizon.net> <4BA64CC5.1030005@heeltoe.com> <4BA7DBFA.8BE5CCD@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: On Wed, Mar 24, 2010 at 3:01 PM, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 22, 2010, at 5:07 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote: >> >> I dealt with a reasonably complex async-design logic system from the 60's >> in >> reverse-engineering and repairing a Casio AL-1000 calculator: >> ? http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~hilpert/eec/misc/CasioAL1000Tech/index.html >> and in particular: >> >> http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~hilpert/eec/misc/CasioAL1000Tech/electronics.html#edgepulse >> What I call 'edge-pulse gates' - a sort of monostable - are injected into >> the >> logic at appropriate places to soak up the glitches (one would have to >> look at >> the schematic to see where/how they are actually used). > > ?Wow. > > ?I am impressed. ?That's one of the most detailed and well-presented > reverse-engineering projects I've ever seen. Wow indeed! That display looks familiar - I might have one on my shelf. I picked up a PCB loaded with vertically-mounted Nixies plus a neon-bulb "minus" indicator many, many years ago at Dayton. I have yet to assemble a driver for it, but I've always thought about repurposing it as a clock/calendar display. The PCB has a small bundle of wires coming off one end, and the foil pattern shows a multiplexed arrangement, IIRC (so 10 cathodes and 13-14 anodes, if I'm remembering it correctly). I should check the PCB for any tell-tale markings. Thanks for the link - it's certainly an interesting device. -ethan From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 24 15:35:48 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 13:35:48 -0700 (PDT) Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double image In-Reply-To: <4BAA47D5.6E89967E@cs.ubc.ca> References: <4BAA16E1.9070503@degnanco.com> <4BAA47D5.6E89967E@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <20100324133021.S33627@shell.lmi.net> In ~1990, I was given one IBM MDP card that had intermittent problems. On close examination, I found that IBM (in original maufacturing) had bent a pin under one of the chips, instead of it being through the hole. The bent pin was making intermittent contact with the pad around the hole that the pin was supposed to go through. Replacing that chip fixed it. Was I too wasteful to replace the whole chip, rather than just one pin? -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 24 15:44:02 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:44:02 +0000 Subject: HP 64000 relocatable file format / assembler Message-ID: <4BAA7992.1030006@philpem.me.uk> All this talk about the HP 64000 has got me thinking... The HP 165xB Inverse Assembler Toolkit includes a DOS-based table assembler that appears to be derived from something used on the HP 64000, and it spits out what the manual calls a "HP 64000 format relocatable object file". This is what the analyser loads to run an IA. Did HP ever publish a spec for the .R (relocatable object) file, or has it ever been successfully reverse engineered? This is one of those "curiosity killed the cat" type projects; I've been wanting to use the HP LA inverse assemblers on a PC since I got my 1651B (mainly because a PC can theoretically handle a much larger symbol table). Writing an assembler / compiler for my own custom format and VM is always an option, I suppose, but I'd rather like to be able to run the HP IAs that I don't have the source code for (ISTR I've got a 68000 one somewhere). Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From als at thangorodrim.de Wed Mar 24 15:42:12 2010 From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 21:42:12 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <6797290367374D76906836B0E2F68348@ANTONIOPC> References: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> <6797290367374D76906836B0E2F68348@ANTONIOPC> Message-ID: <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> On Wed, Mar 24, 2010 at 06:21:41PM -0000, arcarlini at iee.org wrote: > Alexander Schreiber [als at thangorodrim.de] wrote: > > Most electronics these days have a pretty large MTBF - > > usually, by the time you get anywhere near a significant > > fraction of the MTBF the equipment is long obsolete anyway. > > For instance, one of the hard drives in my machines has a > > MTBF of 1.2 _million_ hours, that's about 136 years. Yes, I > > expect it to actually fail a bit sooner (it is a MTBF and not > > a guarantee, after all), but I don't expect the drive to be > > in service in 5 years due to being replaced by a larger one. > > As it happens, the manufacturer actually gives 5 years of > > warranty for that one ... > > MTBF doesn't mean what you think it means. It means if you have > a bank of (say) 1000 such drives and **you swap them for new > ones every time their pass their service life (5 years in your case) > _then_ you'll experience MTBF/num-drives failures every year, on > average**. Yes, that is precisely how I understand the MTBF - if 2 out of 4 drives die in the first month, well, too bad, that's why it is called _mean_ TBF. The fact that the manufacturer is willing to give said 5 years of warranty implies that only a small (but definitely non-zero) number of those disks _should_ die within the first 5 years. > So if you don't swap your drives out every time they go out of warranty, > the MTBF you'll experience is not the MTBF they've quoted. > > Clearly an MTBF of that long should mean that it's unlikely that you'll > experience a dead drive in the first five years that you own it. > > So just two dead ones in the office last week ... I must be lucky :-) Well, just because statistics says that on average you get hit by lightning every 42 years[0] doesn't mean you can't get hit twice on the same day ;-) Regards, Alex. [0] number randomly choosen -- "Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." -- Thomas A. Edison From als at thangorodrim.de Wed Mar 24 15:44:17 2010 From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 21:44:17 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BA92224.4522.2489AB1@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca> <20100324022328.GA22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> <4BA92224.4522.2489AB1@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20100324204417.GB25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 08:18:44PM -0700, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 24 Mar 2010 at 3:23, Alexander Schreiber wrote: > > > You have to go back quite a few years in time to find NiCd chemistry > > in laptop batteries. Anything designed in the last several years is > > some kind of Lithium based (LiIon, LiPoly, ...) battery chemistry. > > Does that fall into the "nothing good in the last 20 years" claim? Hmm? Lithium based battery chemistry is definitely a good thing, especially when compared to NiCd batteries. Nowadays they can even build them in such a way that they don't catch on fire ;-) Regards, Alex. -- "Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." -- Thomas A. Edison From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 24 15:49:57 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:49:57 +0000 Subject: MIPS CPUs Message-ID: <4BAA7AF5.4030100@philpem.me.uk> (Taking this into a separate thread, it has nothing to do with disc analysers). Cameron Kaiser wrote: >> As I understand it, you can design a MIPS chip based on the published >> specs and not have to pay any licensing fees. There was a patent on the >> unaligned load/store instructions, but that expired in 2006 AIUI. > > That's probably why the Chinese have jumped on it (Godson/Loongson), not > that they worry excessively about licensing, but anyway. It's probably why there are so many open-source MIPS cores on Opencores too. I've been playing with UCore this evening and tweaked it to run at about 80MHz on an Altera Cyclone II. Unfortunately the feature list on Opencores is for a newer version of the code, which was apparently never uploaded :( I've got a few 'suspended projects' that would benefit from having a reasonably fast (~100MHz would be nice, ideally with a bit of I-cache and D-cache), 32-bit RISC CPU core with decent compiler/RTOS support. Ucore seems to fit the bill (although there are reports that it doesn't work properly) but the "older version" of the code has support for instruction or data caching :( :( (That and I'll need to rig up some form of bus arbitration scheme to merge the Instruction and Data buses together... now won't that be fun.. at least it's WISHBONE compliant, I suppose) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 24 15:54:35 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 13:54:35 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100324204417.GB25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> References: <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca>, <4BA92224.4522.2489AB1@cclist.sydex.com>, <20100324204417.GB25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> Message-ID: <4BAA199B.18418.1329AE7@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Mar 2010 at 21:44, Alexander Schreiber wrote: > Hmm? Lithium based battery chemistry is definitely a good thing, > especially when compared to NiCd batteries. Nowadays they can even > build them in such a way that they don't catch on fire ;-) I take it that you haven't been reading Tony's posts for awhile... Best, Chuck From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 24 16:00:46 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 21:00:46 +0000 Subject: HP 64000 relocatable file format / assembler In-Reply-To: <4BAA7992.1030006@philpem.me.uk> References: <4BAA7992.1030006@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4BAA7D7E.8020904@philpem.me.uk> Philip Pemberton wrote: > Did HP ever publish a spec for the .R (relocatable object) file, or has > it ever been successfully reverse engineered? Foot, meet mouth. Mouth, meet foot. *mrrrph* The short answer is "yes, there's a spec." It's in HP doc #64980-90933 "HP 64000 File Format Reference Manual". Which is on the Great Oracle of the Internet, bitsavers.org: -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 24 16:01:10 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 14:01:10 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> References: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <6797290367374D76906836B0E2F68348@ANTONIOPC>, <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> Message-ID: <4BAA1B26.7193.1389EC3@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Mar 2010 at 21:42, Alexander Schreiber wrote: > Well, just because statistics says that on average you get hit by > lightning every 42 years[0] doesn't mean you can't get hit twice on > the same day ;-) Or, to put it another way. If in 150 passes 7 was rolled on every pass, the odds that a shooter willl roll 7 on the 151st pass are still one in five. Unless the dice are loaded... :) --Chuck From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 24 15:28:20 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:28:20 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <4BA956AB.3010003@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 24, 10 00:02:51 am Message-ID: > > Fred Cisin wrote: > > "720K" is 250K bits per second at 300 RPM ("DD diskettes) > > (except for some old Sony drives (ask Tony) which ran at 500K/600RPM) > > ... Drives which are often found in HP 1650 series logic analysers (e.g. > my 1651B). Ick. HP used them _a lot_ which is where I mostly come across them, but other manufacturers (for example ACT/Apricot) used them too. Why the 'ich'? They are not difficult to keep going, -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 24 15:55:15 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:55:15 +0000 (GMT) Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double image In-Reply-To: <4BAA16E1.9070503@degnanco.com> from "B Degnan" at Mar 24, 10 09:42:57 am Message-ID: > > I am working with an IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card that > is showing a double image. I noticed that the 106 / 16+ tant cap at the > top left near where C1 / U47 is printed was broken off the board so I > put in a new one. There was no change. I tried another cap, no > change. I removed the cap entirely, no change. I am looking for a > schematic/docs/suggestions. This is certainly not a capacitor problem... I am working from memory (pardon the pun) and if necessary I can dig out the schematics (they're in the Options and Adapters Techref).But I think this board uses 2144s as the video memory (look for 18 pin DIL chips). My expeirence is that that particular RAM has a record of unreliability, and a missing adress line is just the sort of problem you get (and it would cause the repeated image). So my first guess is to replace the RAMs. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 24 15:33:23 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:33:23 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <544087B3B7684DD38A112CE31CE219BD@dell8300> from "Teo Zenios" at Mar 23, 10 08:27:13 pm Message-ID: > Could be something simple like dirt in the landing zone of the HD head, > works fine when running but shut the system down and the head gets stuck. I > have had systems that worked with noise coming from circuits with capacitors > boiling off that did not work when shut down and turned back on. You also Another very common one is that the startup resistor of a switch-mode PSU goes open-circuit while the machine is left on The PSU keeps working as long as the mains is there, but if it gets turned off, or the mains fails, of course it won't restart. Some terminal servers and the like were very prone to this problem. It's a very easy fix once you know which resistor to check. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 24 15:34:26 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:34:26 +0000 (GMT) Subject: IBM 7374 and HP Draftmaster II info needed In-Reply-To: <2b1f1f551003231803j44b2221pa43040404b45c545@mail.gmail.com> from "Joe Giliberti" at Mar 23, 10 09:03:57 pm Message-ID: > > I am trying to dig up information on these two plotters to make them more > sellable. They are among the flotsam amassed by Infoage, and just take up > space. > There are a few manuals for the HP plotter on http://www.hpmuseum.net/ -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 24 16:05:08 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 21:05:08 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <4BAA5690.2030200@dunnington.plus.com> from "Pete Turnbull" at Mar 24, 10 06:14:40 pm Message-ID: > > On 24/03/2010 01:13, Chuck Guzis wrote: > > On 23 Mar 2010 at 23:59, Pete Turnbull wrote: > > > >> Interesting -- I'd not come across that, so I've just learned > >> something new. Any easy ones I should look out for? I think I may > >> have a use for that idea. > > > But if you're like me, I have buckets full of Teac FD235-HF and -HG > > Yes :-) > > > The usual way of adapting these is to replace the S4 jumper with a 1K > > SMT resistor and jumper the S3 pads with a 0-ohm resistor. > > Thanks for that -- I'm sure I'll find a use for it! I am not sure it applies to all FD235s -- Teac are well-known for producing very different drives with slightly different model numbers (I can't rememebr how many toally different FD55s I've worked on...). The service manual I have for the FD235 doesn't explain the jumpers (annoyingly!), it just gives scheamtics where some of the jumpers just l;ink to pins on an ASIC. But it does show a 300/360rpm control input to _some_ of the spindle motor schematics, but not all of them. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 24 15:48:59 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:48:59 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BA92224.4522.2489AB1@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 23, 10 08:18:44 pm Message-ID: > > On 24 Mar 2010 at 3:23, Alexander Schreiber wrote: > > > You have to go back quite a few years in time to find NiCd chemistry > > in laptop batteries. Anything designed in the last several years is > > some kind of Lithium based (LiIon, LiPoly, ...) battery chemistry. > > Does that fall into the "nothing good in the last 20 years" claim? Well, considering my 80x86-based laptop (which is over 20 years old) runs for well over 10 hours before needeing a charge.... [Of coruse it does't have a backlit display. or a colour display, or internal disk drives. You don't use it to watch movies. The memory is row after row of 6264s, the battery islead-acid. No prizes for guessing what it is] -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 24 16:12:59 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 21:12:59 +0000 (GMT) Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double image In-Reply-To: <20100324133021.S33627@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Mar 24, 10 01:35:48 pm Message-ID: > > In ~1990, I was given one IBM MDP card that had intermittent problems. > On close examination, I found that IBM (in original maufacturing) had bent > a pin under one of the chips, instead of it being through the hole. The > bent pin was making intermittent contact with the pad around the hole that > the pin was supposed to go through. Replacing that chip fixed it. > > Was I too wasteful to replace the whole chip, rather than just one pin? I suspect I would have desoldered the chip, cleaned out the hole, straightened the pin and soldered it back in again. -tony From brianlanning at gmail.com Wed Mar 24 16:17:48 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 16:17:48 -0500 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <4BA92224.4522.2489AB1@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003241417g315c2a6ala732c2f5b7859c28@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Mar 24, 2010 at 3:48 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > Well, considering my 80x86-based laptop (which is over 20 years > old) runs for well over 10 hours before needeing a charge.... > > [Of coruse it does't have a backlit display. or a colour display, or > internal disk drives. You don't use it to watch movies. The memory is row > after row of 6264s, the battery islead-acid. No prizes for guessing what > it is] > > An HP Omnibook? That had a really long battery life. Although now that I think of it, that wouldn't be old enough. Back when I worked in a computer store, we sold hundreds of these things. I didn't like them at all because of the display. But business people thought they were great. I especially liked the pop-out mouse. It was an amazingly simple and elegant design. You could even use it in mid-air on an airplane. brian From IanK at vulcan.com Wed Mar 24 16:21:52 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 14:21:52 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <25D81406-4F6F-4D0A-B19E-0CE5A5352FDF@gmail.com> References: <25D81406-4F6F-4D0A-B19E-0CE5A5352FDF@gmail.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Jeremy S. Sharp > Sent: Wednesday, March 24, 2010 3:36 AM > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news > update) > > > Date: Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:14:13 -0500 > > From: John Foust > > Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news > > update) > > To: > > Message-ID: <201003240014.o2O0EISH064655 at billY.EZWIND.NET> > > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > > > > At 07:06 PM 3/23/2010, Dave McGuire wrote: > >> In my experience, on/off cycles kills equipment much faster than > >> long "on" times. > > > > Is that biased by the experience of failures that appear when > > equipment is powered-on? > [snip] > > Is there anybody here who keeps classic big(-ish) iron running 24x7? > I've been told a story of a burning PDP-11/34 which has somewhat put > me off any notion of leaving my -8s turned on when I'm not within > reach of a killswitch & fire extinguisher. :) > PDP-10 model 2065, 24x7 VAX-11/780-5, 24x7 I've often left the PDP-8/e up over the weekend, running diagnostics. -- Ian From derschjo at mail.msu.edu Wed Mar 24 16:22:09 2010 From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 14:22:09 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <2B83A6A6-3113-4A69-B84E-9ABFD8176331@mail.msu.edu> On Mar 24, 2010, at 1:48 PM, ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote: >> >> On 24 Mar 2010 at 3:23, Alexander Schreiber wrote: >> >>> You have to go back quite a few years in time to find NiCd chemistry >>> in laptop batteries. Anything designed in the last several years is >>> some kind of Lithium based (LiIon, LiPoly, ...) battery chemistry. >> >> Does that fall into the "nothing good in the last 20 years" claim? > > Well, considering my 80x86-based laptop (which is over 20 years > old) runs for well over 10 hours before needeing a charge.... > > [Of coruse it does't have a backlit display. or a colour display, or > internal disk drives. You don't use it to watch movies. The memory > is row > after row of 6264s, the battery islead-acid. No prizes for guessing > what > it is] And it must be so fun to lug around (or use on one's lap) with that lead-acid battery :). I'm guessing my netbook could run for quite a time were I willing to lug a car battery around with it :). - Josh > > -tony > From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Mar 24 16:24:44 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:24:44 -0600 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BAA1B26.7193.1389EC3@cclist.sydex.com> References: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <6797290367374D76906836B0E2F68348@ANTONIOPC>, <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> <4BAA1B26.7193.1389EC3@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4BAA831C.9040203@jetnet.ab.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 24 Mar 2010 at 21:42, Alexander Schreiber wrote: > >> Well, just because statistics says that on average you get hit by >> lightning every 42 years[0] doesn't mean you can't get hit twice on >> the same day ;-) > > Or, to put it another way. If in 150 passes 7 was rolled on every > pass, the odds that a shooter willl roll 7 on the 151st pass are > still one in five. > > Unless the dice are loaded... :) I thought it was the shot-gun loaded! > --Chuck > From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 24 16:30:11 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 14:30:11 -0700 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: References: <4BAA5690.2030200@dunnington.plus.com> from "Pete Turnbull" at Mar 24, 10 06:14:40 pm, Message-ID: <4BAA21F3.17007.15330A4@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Mar 2010 at 21:05, Tony Duell wrote: > I am not sure it applies to all FD235s -- Teac are well-known for > producing very different drives with slightly different model numbers I am well aware of that. Many earlier models do not have this, but the ones I described--the later ones with only a drive-select jumper generally do. Between various models, the jumpers are located in various places on the boards. For uniformity's sake, I like the 6xxx series of 235HF and have a couple of cartons of those yet. Enough to meet foreseeable needs. Even less well documented is how to change the spindle speed on an FD- 05 But it is possible. --Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 24 16:32:08 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 14:32:08 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <4BA92224.4522.2489AB1@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 23, 10 08:18:44 pm, Message-ID: <4BAA2268.6986.154FA19@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Mar 2010 at 20:48, Tony Duell wrote: > [Of coruse it does't have a backlit display. or a colour display, or > internal disk drives. You don't use it to watch movies. The memory is > row after row of 6264s, the battery islead-acid. No prizes for > guessing what it is] HP-110? I seem to remember seeing a pack of Gates D-sized lead-acid cells in the battery compartment of one. --Chuck From nico at farumdata.dk Wed Mar 24 16:50:45 2010 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 22:50:45 +0100 Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* References: <4BAA5690.2030200@dunnington.plus.com> from "Pete Turnbull" at Mar 24, 10 06:14:40 pm, <4BAA21F3.17007.15330A4@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: Subject: Re: Reusing old floppy *drives* > >> I am not sure it applies to all FD235s -- Teac are well-known for >> producing very different drives with slightly different model numbers > The 5.25" FD55GFR was found in various qualities. In my conversion systems I used them for e.g. AS400. At one point, I got a series of failures on those drives. It showed that the drives made in India couldnt change reliably between 300 and 360 RPM, but the FD55GFR-142U series from Japan had no problem. From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Wed Mar 24 16:51:50 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 21:51:50 +0000 Subject: HP 64000 relocatable file format / assembler In-Reply-To: <4BAA7D7E.8020904@philpem.me.uk> References: <4BAA7992.1030006@philpem.me.uk> <4BAA7D7E.8020904@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4BAA8976.9020602@philpem.me.uk> OK, here's an interesting one. The .R files have had a 20-byte header tacked on... From my hex editor: 8203 4049 3830 3835 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 004B | .. at I8085 .K Anyone care to take a guess what this is? "I8085" is the filename of the IA file (with the extension chopped off), but I haven't the foggiest idea what the other bytes are for. Everything after the 20-byte header seems to match up with what the 64000 documentation says, though. Which is nice, as it'll make writing a loader *much* easier. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 24 17:47:43 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:47:43 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BAA1B26.7193.1389EC3@cclist.sydex.com> References: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <6797290367374D76906836B0E2F68348@ANTONIOPC>, <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> <4BAA1B26.7193.1389EC3@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20100324154648.S38426@shell.lmi.net> On Wed, 24 Mar 2010, Chuck Guzis wrote: > Or, to put it another way. If in 150 passes 7 was rolled on every > pass, the odds that a shooter willl roll 7 on the 151st pass are > still one in five. > > Unless the dice are loaded... :) 150 consecutive 7's would be adequate to suspect that the dice MIGHT have an imperfection. From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 24 17:53:33 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:53:33 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <2B83A6A6-3113-4A69-B84E-9ABFD8176331@mail.msu.edu> References: <2B83A6A6-3113-4A69-B84E-9ABFD8176331@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: <20100324155022.R38426@shell.lmi.net> On Wed, 24 Mar 2010, Josh Dersch wrote: > And it must be so fun to lug around (or use on one's lap) with that > lead-acid battery :). I'm guessing my netbook could run for quite a > time were I willing to lug a car battery around with it :). Lee Felsenstein designed THAT capability into the original Osborne. From arcarlini at iee.org Wed Mar 24 17:58:37 2010 From: arcarlini at iee.org (arcarlini at iee.org) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 22:58:37 -0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> Message-ID: <6042667ECC9F44528BEC387CE68C477D@ANTONIOPC> Alexander Schreiber [als at thangorodrim.de] wrote: > Yes, that is precisely how I understand the MTBF - if 2 out > of 4 drives die in the first month, well, too bad, that's why > it is called _mean_ TBF. The fact that the manufacturer is > willing to give said 5 years of warranty implies that only a > small (but definitely non-zero) number of those disks > _should_ die within the first 5 years. It sounds like you've still missed a bit. The MTBF of 136 years doesn't mean that your drive might last 136 years on average, nor does it mean that if you buy 136 drives you should expect one failure per year on average. It means that if you replace each and every drive every time they reach the end of their service life (usually five years) *then* you can expect the above things. So your drive will probably fail one in 136 years *iff* you swap it out for a brand new drive 27 times (or so) during those 136 years. I'll grant you that it also means that the odds of your original drive failing in those initial five years must also be fairly small - just nowhere near as small as you might think. Antonio From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 24 17:59:08 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:59:08 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100324154648.S38426@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <4BAA1B26.7193.1389EC3@cclist.sydex.com>, <20100324154648.S38426@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BAA36CC.1574.1A49F42@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Mar 2010 at 15:47, Fred Cisin wrote: > 150 consecutive 7's would be adequate to suspect that the dice MIGHT > have an imperfection. But hardly conclusive--unless you're a lawyer or casino operator. --Chuck From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Wed Mar 24 17:16:10 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 22:16:10 -0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) References: <4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca><017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa><4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa><4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com><015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa><201003240014.o2O0EISH064655@billY.EZWIND.NET> <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> Message-ID: <00fe01cacba5$aefc1980$abfdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Alexander Schreiber" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Wednesday, March 24, 2010 2:45 AM Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > > There are several things that kill machines on powerup, among them > - electrical surges > - thermal changes > - for hard drives, especially older ones running for a long time, > stiction (having the heads stick to the platters) > - running out of power cycles > > The last one is/was an issue for laptop drives, as they are specified only > for a limited number of powercycles. With very aggressive power management > shutting them down/powering them up every few minutes, that number isn't > as large as one might think. > Limited number of power cycles? Is there any way to know what this figure started off at? And better yet, a way to reset it? :) Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Mar 24 18:02:53 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 17:02:53 -0600 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BAA36CC.1574.1A49F42@cclist.sydex.com> References: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <4BAA1B26.7193.1389EC3@cclist.sydex.com>, <20100324154648.S38426@shell.lmi.net> <4BAA36CC.1574.1A49F42@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4BAA9A1D.8040506@jetnet.ab.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 24 Mar 2010 at 15:47, Fred Cisin wrote: > > >> 150 consecutive 7's would be adequate to suspect that the dice MIGHT >> have an imperfection. > > But hardly conclusive--unless you're a lawyer or casino operator. > > --Chuck I smell something fishy ... Common die only go from 1 thru 6. :) From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 24 18:20:16 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 16:20:16 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BAA9A1D.8040506@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <4BAA36CC.1574.1A49F42@cclist.sydex.com>, <4BAA9A1D.8040506@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4BAA3BC0.26722.1B7FA47@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Mar 2010 at 17:02, Ben wrote: > I smell something fishy ... Common die only go from 1 thru 6. :) Craps is played with a pair of dice. Baby needs a new pair of shoes. --Chuck From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 24 18:21:27 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 16:21:27 -0700 (PDT) Subject: OT: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BAA9A1D.8040506@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <4BAA1B26.7193.1389EC3@cclist.sydex.com>, <20100324154648.S38426@shell.lmi.net> <4BAA36CC.1574.1A49F42@cclist.sydex.com> <4BAA9A1D.8040506@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <20100324161518.O38426@shell.lmi.net> > >> 150 consecutive 7's would be adequate to suspect that the dice MIGHT > >> have an imperfection. > > But hardly conclusive--unless you're a lawyer or casino operator. Absolutely not proof. But, I would be willing to place my bet! On Wed, 24 Mar 2010, Ben wrote: > I smell something fishy ... Common die only go from 1 thru 6. :) But "dice" is plural - presumably 2. Die is singular. Do you think that Chuck's "1 in 5" probablity is correct? (or did he mean "1 in 6" or "1 TO 5"?) There is a little test jig that is sometimes used, that holds diagonal corners of the die between centers, for a spin. If the die reverses direction of rotation right before it settles to a stop, then it fails. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From arcarlini at iee.org Wed Mar 24 18:35:14 2010 From: arcarlini at iee.org (arcarlini at iee.org) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 23:35:14 -0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <00fe01cacba5$aefc1980$abfdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: Andrew Burton [aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk] wrote: > Limited number of power cycles? Is there any way to know what > this figure started off at? And better yet, a way to reset it? :) Most modern drives support SMART ... and some of them (but not all) even correctly count and report the number of power cycles. UBCD has a range of disk diagnostic tools, modern Linux variants have smarttools, you can track down any number of disk monitoring tools for Windows. Antonio From pcoghlan+cctech at vms.eurokom.ie Wed Mar 24 18:12:09 2010 From: pcoghlan+cctech at vms.eurokom.ie (Peter Coghlan) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 23:12:09 +0000 (WET) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) Message-ID: <01NL55UD574YQ3AJZS@vms.eurokom.ie> > >Another very common one is that the startup resistor of a switch-mode PSU >goes open-circuit while the machine is left on The PSU keeps working as >long as the mains is there, but if it gets turned off, or the mains >fails, of course it won't restart. > >Some terminal servers and the like were very prone to this problem. > >It's a very easy fix once you know which resistor to check. > I've had a slightly related fault in the switch-mode power supply (wall wart) of a Decserver 90 terminal server. A small electrolytic smoothing the supply from the startup resistor had lost capacitance. Lisening closely to the power supply, I could hear a high pitched whine which made me think there was a good chance this was normal vibration of the chopper transformer and threw me right off finding the real problem. When the capacitor was replaced, the whine went away and the power supply worked correctly, for a few weeks before it failed again. I haven't had the heart to investigate further. Regarding Dec equipment, recent experiences are making me speculate that leaving some items turned off for a few months might be bad for them! - An Alpha 3000/300 in continuous use for several years was retired. When I next turned it on several months later, it gave a loud bang and emitted smoke from the PSU. This turned out to be from a VDR which had exploded due to a triac shorting. (This wasn't easy to track down as the VDR had been sleeved with rubber which completely hid the problem.) The function of the triac was to automatically switch between 115V and 230V input. Its shorting left the PSU permanently in 115V mode and the power around here is 230V. Replacing the VDR (after a good bit of fun tracking down a suitable replacement) and snipping out the triac (which I couldn't find a replacement for) solved the problem at the expense of being able to operate on a 115V supply. - A HSZ80 disk controller, like the 3000/300, also failed with a loud bang, without smoke though, making it difficult to figure out which of the many items plugged into the extension lead had blown the house fuse this time. An unmarked item across the mains which looks like a VDR or disc capacitor had shorted. I can't replace it as I have no idea what its spec is. - A Vaxstation 3100, also in continuous use for several years was similarly retired. In service, it had suffered very occasional memory failures but nothing persistent. When I switched it on a few months later, several problems were apparant. Firstly, one of the fans in the PSU ran for a short while and seized. Secondly, the memory power-on test failed to complete. It didn't report an error but the machine reset in the middle of the test and went back to the beginning of the power-on tests in an infinte loop. It's not supposed to do that! Removing both 4MB memory expansion boards got past that problem but resulted in a horrible error from the SCSI driver on attempting to boot, presumably because there was not enough memory on the motherboard. Replacing one memory board (either one!) got by this problem but it then became apparant that the disk was failing with lots of clunking and clicking and various errors reported. Finally, the "compose" light on the keyboard remains lit all the time which as far as I recall may be intended to indicate that all is not well in some part of the system in the event that nothing appears on the graphics console. - A Microvax 3100 model 80 retired for some years was quite happy to perform correctly for a few hours when switched back on. However, after later shutting down and restarting, it died in the middle of the memory test and produced no console output since. It's been a while since I looked at it and I can't remember what indication the diagnostic leds gave. I'm sure if they gave any useful lead I would have followed it up though. Sometime I feel like my kit is failing quicker than I can get around to fixing it. Regards, Peter. From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 24 18:43:48 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 16:43:48 -0700 Subject: OT: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100324161518.O38426@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <4BAA9A1D.8040506@jetnet.ab.ca>, <20100324161518.O38426@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BAA4144.4831.1CD8615@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Mar 2010 at 16:21, Fred Cisin wrote: > Do you think that Chuck's "1 in 5" probablity is correct? > (or did he mean "1 in 6" or "1 TO 5"?) It depends if you're betting for money or not. The actual probability is 5:1, but most casinos pay at 4:1, giving them about a 17% "edge". --Chuck From dkelvey at hotmail.com Wed Mar 24 18:51:36 2010 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 16:51:36 -0700 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double image In-Reply-To: <20100324133021.S33627@shell.lmi.net> References: <4BAA16E1.9070503@degnanco.com> <4BAA47D5.6E89967E@cs.ubc.ca>,<20100324133021.S33627@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: > Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 13:35:48 -0700 > From: cisin at xenosoft.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double image > > In ~1990, I was given one IBM MDP card that had intermittent problems. > On close examination, I found that IBM (in original maufacturing) had bent > a pin under one of the chips, instead of it being through the hole. The > bent pin was making intermittent contact with the pad around the hole that > the pin was supposed to go through. Replacing that chip fixed it. > > Was I too wasteful to replace the whole chip, rather than just one pin? > > > -- Hi Fred I might have just ran a wire through the hole and tacked it onto the pin. This really depends on who I was doing this for. If for a customer, I'd have replaced the chip. If for me, as I stated, I'd most like not even bothered to remove the part. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ The New Busy is not the old busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_3 From pete at dunnington.plus.com Wed Mar 24 18:50:09 2010 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 23:50:09 +0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <25D81406-4F6F-4D0A-B19E-0CE5A5352FDF@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BAAA531.3010104@dunnington.plus.com> On 24/03/2010 21:21, Ian King wrote: >> Is there anybody here who keeps classic big(-ish) iron running 24x7? >> I've been told a story of a burning PDP-11/34 which has somewhat put >> me off any notion of leaving my -8s turned on when I'm not within >> reach of a killswitch & fire extinguisher. :) > > PDP-10 model 2065, 24x7 > VAX-11/780-5, 24x7 > > I've often left the PDP-8/e up over the weekend, running diagnostics. -- Ian I've left my 8E running little display programs for weeks on end during the winter, and have done the same with various -11s from time to time. I've only once had a problem, when a nearby lightning strike caused a surge that killed the mains input filter on a PDP-11/34; no real harm done apart from that, and reasonably easy to fix. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From eric at brouhaha.com Wed Mar 24 19:10:48 2010 From: eric at brouhaha.com (Eric Smith) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 17:10:48 -0700 Subject: Talking of old IBM systems In-Reply-To: <8d8b0a5c9c4f2a345e990485f6059cb4@bellsouth.net> References: <8d8b0a5c9c4f2a345e990485f6059cb4@bellsouth.net> Message-ID: <4BAAAA08.1020808@brouhaha.com> blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: > Back then they'd lease > you their grandmother but not sell much of anything. Actually they would sell you anything that they would lease, at commensurate pricing. That was part of their 1956 Consent Decree: http://www.cptech.org/at/ibm/ibm1956cd.html That's what allowed a thriving market for leasing from third parties rather than IBM itself. When IBM got machines back from lease, or as an exchange in an upgrade deal, if they couldn't (or didn't want to) lease them out to another customer, they would make sure they were destroyed in order to prevent them from finding their way back into third-party sales or leasing. This is why there are so few surviving 360 and 370 systems. Eric From menadeau at comcast.net Wed Mar 24 19:16:45 2010 From: menadeau at comcast.net (Michael Nadeau) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:16:45 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: ----- Original Message ----- From: "Joe Giliberti" The machine in the fake advert looks as though it could have existed at one point Yep. It looks like an Oki if800. It was also sold under the BMC and Sumicom brands. They probably photoshopped an old ad. On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:54 PM, Marcin Wichary wrote: > For those unfamiliar with The Onion?s style of humour, this is a joke. :) > > On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum > wrote: > > > What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or > > (looks > > like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are hurting for > $$$ > > I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C > > computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and > those > > guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool > looking > > computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY reference or > a > > Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. Judging > > from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't > know > > how to market themselves very well. > > > > > > Curt > > > > > > > > > > Evan Koblentz wrote: > > > >> > >> > http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ > >> > >> > From dkelvey at hotmail.com Wed Mar 24 19:26:37 2010 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 17:26:37 -0700 Subject: Talking of old IBM systems In-Reply-To: References: <01CACB0D.09B5C040@MSE_D03>, Message-ID: > From: nico at farumdata.dk > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Talking of old IBM systems > Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:58:53 +0100 > > Reading a thread on old RS/6000's, I came to think of something I heard in > the 80's or thereabouts. > It was said, that decommissioned 360's were dumped in the Atlantic, to > prevent that they fell in the hands of the OEM manufacturers. > Is there any truth in this statement? > > > Hi Not sure which machines were involved but there was a junkyard near San Luis Obispo, Ca that did in IBM lease machines. They'd run a bulldozer over them. I remember finding a nice fan that I used in the dorm to move air on hot days and also one frame of core memory ( that I've since lost ). That was in ( I think ) 1969. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Trusted email with powerful SPAM protection. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/210850553/direct/01/ From curt at atarimuseum.com Wed Mar 24 19:49:33 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:49:33 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BAAB31D.6060707@atarimuseum.com> Nice design! Michael Nadeau wrote: > > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Joe Giliberti" > The machine in the fake advert looks as though it could have existed > at one > point > > Yep. It looks like an Oki if800. It was also sold under the BMC and > Sumicom brands. They probably photoshopped an old ad. > > > On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:54 PM, Marcin Wichary > wrote: > >> For those unfamiliar with The Onion?s style of humour, this is a >> joke. :) >> >> On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 6:50 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum >> wrote: >> >> > What's not so funny is, the article could've mentioned a telco# or >> > (looks >> > like these guys don't have one - a website) --- If they are >> hurting for >> $$$ >> > I'm sure enough of us calling to see if they have any of their X-117C >> > computers or parts still lying around, we'd all help buy those up and >> those >> > guys would make a few bucks, I for one think that is a damned cool >> looking >> > computer, I wonder if it was a CP/M box... I can't find ANY >> reference or >> a >> > Xalaga computer anywhere, and never heard of one until today. >> Judging >> > from that alone, looks like these guys biggest problem is they didn't >> know >> > how to market themselves very well. >> > >> > >> > Curt >> > >> > >> > >> > >> > Evan Koblentz wrote: >> > >> >> >> >> >> http://www.theonion.com/articles/computer-company-started-in-garage-30-years-ago-no,17124/ >> >> >> >> >> >> > > > From geneb at deltasoft.com Wed Mar 24 20:29:00 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 18:29:00 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 24 Mar 2010, Michael Nadeau wrote: > > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Joe Giliberti" > The machine in the fake advert looks as though it could have existed at one > point > > Yep. It looks like an Oki if800. It was also sold under the BMC and Sumicom > brands. They probably photoshopped an old ad. > Way back in the day I had a Sumicom System 330. Interesting little x86 machine. Kind of IBM compatible. Used an 8251 for the serial board instead of an 8250. g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From als at thangorodrim.de Wed Mar 24 20:24:10 2010 From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 02:24:10 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <4BA92224.4522.2489AB1@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20100325012410.GD25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> On Wed, Mar 24, 2010 at 08:48:59PM +0000, Tony Duell wrote: > > > > On 24 Mar 2010 at 3:23, Alexander Schreiber wrote: > > > > > You have to go back quite a few years in time to find NiCd chemistry > > > in laptop batteries. Anything designed in the last several years is > > > some kind of Lithium based (LiIon, LiPoly, ...) battery chemistry. > > > > Does that fall into the "nothing good in the last 20 years" claim? > > Well, considering my 80x86-based laptop (which is over 20 years > old) runs for well over 10 hours before needeing a charge.... And I've got a machine that operates for weeks of moderate daily use on two AA cells. > [Of coruse it does't have a backlit display. or a colour display, or > internal disk drives. You don't use it to watch movies. Same with the above mentioned machine. It is also not exactly the most powerful machine around. But if you want modern hardware capabilities, then one of the prices you've got to pay is a power consumption of quite a bit more than a few hundred mW. > The memory is row > after row of 6264s, the battery islead-acid. No prizes for guessing what > it is] 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 Wed Mar 24 20:19:19 2010 From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 02:19:19 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <00fe01cacba5$aefc1980$abfdf93e@user8459cef6fa> References: <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <201003240014.o2O0EISH064655@billY.EZWIND.NET> <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> <00fe01cacba5$aefc1980$abfdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <20100325011918.GC25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> On Wed, Mar 24, 2010 at 10:16:10PM -0000, Andrew Burton wrote: > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Alexander Schreiber" > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > Sent: Wednesday, March 24, 2010 2:45 AM > Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > > > > > There are several things that kill machines on powerup, among them > > - electrical surges > > - thermal changes > > - for hard drives, especially older ones running for a long time, > > stiction (having the heads stick to the platters) > > - running out of power cycles > > > > The last one is/was an issue for laptop drives, as they are specified only > > for a limited number of powercycles. With very aggressive power management > > shutting them down/powering them up every few minutes, that number isn't > > as large as one might think. > > > > Limited number of power cycles? The datasheet should have that number. > Is there any way to know what this figure > started off at? Basically any SATA drive (and most SCSI ones, but with less data) made these days supports SMART, which contains quite a few useful bits of data, among them such things as start/stop count, power on hours, reallocated sector count ... although apparently with some (especially older) drives, not all of that data is reliable. > And better yet, a way to reset it? :) Time travel? 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 Wed Mar 24 20:53:19 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 18:53:19 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100325011918.GC25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> References: <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com> <00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com> <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <201003240014.o2O0EISH064655@billY.EZWIND.NET> <20100324024532.GB22056@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> <00fe01cacba5$aefc1980$abfdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <20100325011918.GC25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> Message-ID: <20100324185134.V38426@shell.lmi.net> > > And better yet, a way to reset it? :) > Time travel? But, that might only work for an IBM 5100 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor From jdbryan at acm.org Wed Mar 24 21:32:14 2010 From: jdbryan at acm.org (J. David Bryan) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 22:32:14 -0400 Subject: HP 64000 relocatable file format / assembler In-Reply-To: <4BAA8976.9020602@philpem.me.uk> References: <4BAA7992.1030006@philpem.me.uk>, <4BAA7D7E.8020904@philpem.me.uk>, <4BAA8976.9020602@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: On Wednesday, March 24, 2010 at 21:51, Philip Pemberton wrote: > Everything after the 20-byte header seems to match up with what the > 64000 documentation says, though. I use the HP 10391B Inverse Assembler Development Package with my 64620 state analyzer. The .R file produced by the IA is nearly compatible with the 64000. To use it, though, I had to write a program to: 1. strip off that 20-byte header, and 2. alter the NAME record to conform to the 64000 relocatable format Once these are done, the 64620 will accept the file produced by the IA. My notes on item #2 say: The Name Record differs only slightly from the HP 64000 format. The difference is in the source filename field. The 64000 defines this as a fixed-length field of 8 words that contains the filename, user ID, and disc number. The IAL assembler produces a variable-length field containing the full pathname (drive, directories, filename, and extension) to the source file. We convert the latter by using the base filename, which will be eight characters or less, as the IAL assembler is a DOS program, as the filename. We set the user ID to "IAL" and the disc number to zero. All other portions of the Name Record are valid and are copied into the 64000 version, and a new checksum is calculated. -- Dave From maurice.smulders at gmail.com Wed Mar 24 23:23:24 2010 From: maurice.smulders at gmail.com (maurice smulders) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 22:23:24 -0600 Subject: HP 64000 relocatable file format / assembler In-Reply-To: <4BAA8976.9020602@philpem.me.uk> References: <4BAA7992.1030006@philpem.me.uk> <4BAA7D7E.8020904@philpem.me.uk> <4BAA8976.9020602@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <7d9403581003242123o47f91b2aua45936e5016e870d@mail.gmail.com> Hello, Both the dos downloader as well as the assembler do run under DOSBOX 0.73. The downloader uses the virtual serial ports offered by the app fine... I am picking apart the translation the file undergoes from DOS format to HPLIF DOS format (with the LIF header) so I can generate a file directly that way... Maurice From jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de Thu Mar 25 01:42:14 2010 From: jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de (Jochen Kunz) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 07:42:14 +0100 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <4BA8D32E.28377.114278E@cclist.sydex.com> References: <746B553C-2BC8-498C-9220-5A1B00F7458F@neurotica.com> <4BA8D32E.28377.114278E@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20100325074214.bf15f8b1.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> On Tue, 23 Mar 2010 14:41:50 -0700 "Chuck Guzis" wrote: > Why buy 8 bits when > you can get 32 for the same price in an upward-compatible package? Power consumtion? If you need somthing that runs off a button cell for years... And what speciffic Cortex M0 ARM controller are you reffering to? They seem to be still more expensive then 8 bitters. -- tsch??, Jochen Homepage: http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/ From jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de Thu Mar 25 01:50:16 2010 From: jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de (Jochen Kunz) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 07:50:16 +0100 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <20100318131530.GI3420@n0jcf.net> References: <4BA16E6C.9090109@philpem.me.uk> <20100318131530.GI3420@n0jcf.net> Message-ID: <20100325075016.1564a283.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> On Thu, 18 Mar 2010 08:15:30 -0500 Chris Elmquist wrote: > And do those debugger tools run on any OS other than Windows? Don't know about that speciffic PIC tool. But there are JTAG in circuit debugger that interface to gdb(1) on Linux. You can set breakpoints, single step, inspect and modify data, ... all on source code level. -- tsch??, Jochen Homepage: http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/ From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Thu Mar 25 01:50:55 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 01:50:55 -0500 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <20100325074214.bf15f8b1.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> References: , <746B553C-2BC8-498C-9220-5A1B00F7458F@neurotica.com>, <4BA8D32E.28377.114278E@cclist.sydex.com>, <20100325074214.bf15f8b1.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> Message-ID: Never byte off more than you can eschew. Randy > Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 07:42:14 +0100 > From: jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update > > On Tue, 23 Mar 2010 14:41:50 -0700 > "Chuck Guzis" wrote: > > > Why buy 8 bits when > > you can get 32 for the same price in an upward-compatible package? > Power consumtion? If you need somthing that runs off a button cell for > years... And what speciffic Cortex M0 ARM controller are you reffering > to? They seem to be still more expensive then 8 bitters. > -- > > > tsch??, > Jochen > > Homepage: http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/ > _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail is redefining busy with tools for the New Busy. Get more from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_2 From bqt at softjar.se Wed Mar 24 10:09:47 2010 From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 16:09:47 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BAA2B3B.7020807@softjar.se> "Jeremy S. Sharp" wrote: > Is there anybody here who keeps classic big(-ish) iron running 24x7? > I've been told a story of a burning PDP-11/34 which has somewhat put > me off any notion of leaving my -8s turned on when I'm not within > reach of a killswitch & fire extinguisher. :) At the moment, nothing more than my 11/93. Current uptime about a month. I used to manage an 11/70 as well. It's still on standby, but powered down most of the time right now because of cooling problems, and electricity bill. (Same with a VAX-8650.) Johnny From rodsmallwood at btconnect.com Thu Mar 25 03:11:05 2010 From: rodsmallwood at btconnect.com (Rod Smallwood) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 08:11:05 -0000 Subject: Scrapping and re-use (was Re: Talking of old IBM systems) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6A86FD0F8CF14901A969B4522B879B88@RodsDevSystem> Although I was working at DEC at the time I do not remember anything about scrapped boards being resold. If they were in systems on Field Service contracts the ECO levels and where they had them, serial numbers would give them away. Even in those far off days systems were quite well documented. If they were not under warranty and not under FS contract they would not have been considered DEC's problem. If they were manufacturing rejects they would have had the gold edge connectors cut off. Regards ? Rod Smallwood -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Ethan Dicks Sent: 24 March 2010 16:06 To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Scrapping and re-use (was Re: Talking of old IBM systems) On Wed, Mar 24, 2010 at 11:30 AM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 24 Mar 2010 at 9:16, blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: > >> I don't know about the ocean, but they did send them off to >> scrap yards and stuff to be demolished... > > There's another aspect to the problem, that CDC ran into during the > 70's--that of used parts finding their way into the mainstream. > Apparently, this was enough of a problem that CDC ordered that any > decommissioned system be reduced to unusable junk... DEC had a problem in the 1980s with parts and machines that had been scrapped ending back in the sales stream. The big problems for them were maintaining the perception of quality (much of what got scrapped had failed some aspect of the testing process) and the tax issue of claiming that an item was scrapped but still out in the world. I was told one source of this was the recyclers picking through the bins of scrap coming from DEC and reselling things that were deemed resellable. They were paying by the pound for precious and ferrous metal scrap but making much more from the occasional gem. As the story goes, DEC bought a large shredder (large enough to accept 19" racks!), ensuring that re-use would not be feasible. We had a similar issue at Software Results - obsolete (prototypes and Rev 0 boards) and unrepairable boards were lying around after they'd been scrapped - we couldn't repair them since they'd been written off, so since they were large and green (because of the solder mask), one of our student employees nailed a bunch of them to a wooden frame in an irregular isosceles triangle pattern and made a "COMBOARD Christmas Tree" (using 9-track write rings as ornaments and tractor-feed tearoffs as garlands). Because the boards were rendered more unusable (as computer peripherals) by drilling nail holes in them, it was considered an acceptable re-use. I wish I had a picture of it still. -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 25 04:12:01 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 02:12:01 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <20100325074214.bf15f8b1.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> References: , <4BA8D32E.28377.114278E@cclist.sydex.com>, <20100325074214.bf15f8b1.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> Message-ID: <4BAAC671.2753.3D5BE6A@cclist.sydex.com> On 25 Mar 2010 at 7:42, Jochen Kunz wrote: > Power consumtion? If you need somthing that runs off a button cell for > years... And what speciffic Cortex M0 ARM controller are you reffering > to? They seem to be still more expensive then 8 bitters. -- http://ics.nxp.com/products/mcus/cortex-m0/ --Chuck From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 25 06:10:55 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 11:10:55 +0000 Subject: HP 64000 relocatable file format / assembler In-Reply-To: References: <4BAA7992.1030006@philpem.me.uk>, <4BAA7D7E.8020904@philpem.me.uk>, <4BAA8976.9020602@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4BAB44BF.9030603@philpem.me.uk> J. David Bryan wrote: > I use the HP 10391B Inverse Assembler Development Package with my 64620 > state analyzer. The .R file produced by the IA is nearly compatible with > the 64000. To use it, though, I had to write a program to: > > 1. strip off that 20-byte header, and > 2. alter the NAME record to conform to the 64000 relocatable format Yeah, I noticed that there was "something" different about the file. I can get the checksum for the NAME record to match up perfectly, then there's a DOUBLE record after that. The checksum for that NEVER matches up and I can't find the criteria for making it do so. My code just hits the 128-word limit and bails out :-/ > The IAL assembler produces a variable-length > field containing the full pathname (drive, directories, filename, and > extension) to the source file. We convert the latter by using the > base filename, which will be eight characters or less, as the IAL > assembler is a DOS program, as the filename. We set the user ID to > "IAL" and the disc number to zero. All other portions of the Name > Record are valid and are copied into the 64000 version, and a new > checksum is calculated. I'll have a look at that -- for now, all my IAL files have been assembled in C:\IA, so the filenames are quite short ("C:\IA\I8085.S" as an example; 13 characters plus the null). I don't suppose you have some code (or even snippets of code) that you could share? Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From billdeg at degnanco.com Thu Mar 25 07:42:46 2010 From: billdeg at degnanco.com (B Degnan) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 08:42:46 -0400 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com> > This is certainly not a capacitor problem... > > I think this board uses 2144s as the video memory > So my first guess is to replace the RAMs. > > -tony > > ---- > > I'd be looking for a stuck address bit, or possibly a failed RAM chip > My money's on a 74xx chip (possibly a counter, buffer or multiplexer) > that's had an output fail open. > > Phil > > ----- > Along with Phil's suggestion of memory addressing issues resulting in a > double-scan of the memory, the staggering of the images suggests interlacing > might be occurring when it shouldn't be. Sometimes it is possible to tweak the > V/H-hold controls enough on monitors to end up with interlacing occurring when > it shouldn't. Can you discern whether each of the scan images contains a full > set of lines vs half the number of lines? > > I hate to ask, but what sort of monitor is this being displayed on? > IIRC the scan rate for MDA was higher than NTSC and I'm not not sure whether an > NTSC monitor would sync up or sync down to half the scan rate. > > Brent ----------------- Thanks for the feedback. I am using a standard IBM monochrome monitor. I tested the monitor with another known-working card, and I also tried another monitor. The problem is with the display card. This is one of the original black connector versions of the IBM 1904057 XM 407 display cards. It has 9114 RAMs in it, not socketed of course, so I think if I can probe each RAM chip first to ID the bad chip it'd be more efficient. I would similarly have to check the 74L chips. oy! Bill Degnan From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Thu Mar 25 08:47:15 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 09:47:15 -0400 Subject: Scrapping and re-use (was Re: Talking of old IBM systems) In-Reply-To: <6A86FD0F8CF14901A969B4522B879B88@RodsDevSystem> References: <6A86FD0F8CF14901A969B4522B879B88@RodsDevSystem> Message-ID: On 3/25/10, Rod Smallwood wrote: > > Although I was working at DEC at the time I do not remember anything about > scrapped boards being resold. You were working in the UK, were you not? The stories I was hearing were told to me at a DECUS in the late 1980s in Anaheim, presumably about activities in the States. > If they were in systems on Field Service > contracts the ECO levels and where they had them, serial numbers would give > them away. Even in those far off days systems were quite well documented. Certainly. There was also a lot of "self-maintenance" at the time, at least in the US. If folks could not afford DEC Field Service, there were third-party vendors galore to turn to for board-level spares. When the company was doing well, most of our big machines were under contract, but over time, more and more were allowed to lapse until I was doing maintenance for 95% of what broke, just as an example. Any items from this stream were already gray-market before they hit the streets. My understanding is that the arrangement was discovered when the occasional naive customer attempted to get service for something from DEC and the numbers didn't check out, so in the end the system "worked", even if there was a gap for a time. > If they were not under warranty and not under FS contract they would not > have been considered DEC's problem. If they were manufacturing rejects they > would have had the gold edge connectors cut off. There would have been plenty of salvageable stuff even if 100% of the Qbus and Unibus boards had the fingers cut off before leaving the Mill (though it's entirely possible the scrappers were originally cutting those off themselves for gold recovery - it would have depended entirely on the arrangements negotiated). Back in the early-to-mid 1980s, intact system boards would have had a high potential resale value, but practically any DEC part was bought and sold by third-party vendors. Someone just took advantage of a situation, which was corrected by shoving all the material through teeth that let nothing bigger than a large postage stamp through. But as you say, you were there and I wasn't, so the story is hardly incontrovertible. It was already hearsay when I heard it 20ish years ago. -ethan From jbmcb1 at gmail.com Thu Mar 25 08:53:35 2010 From: jbmcb1 at gmail.com (Jason McBrien) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 09:53:35 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <5f7d1b0e1003250653g40ce671fg48c8fa85b80e072b@mail.gmail.com> The only "real" part of The Onion are it's media reviews, called the Onion A.V. Club. It has really excellent music and movie reviews. Don't worry about getting fooled, Curt: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Onion#The_Onion_taken_seriously The best is when Pravda reproduces Onion articles, nearly verbatim, as real news from the U.S. From ragooman at comcast.net Thu Mar 25 09:13:14 2010 From: ragooman at comcast.net (Dan Roganti) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 10:13:14 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <5f7d1b0e1003250653g40ce671fg48c8fa85b80e072b@mail.gmail.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <5f7d1b0e1003250653g40ce671fg48c8fa85b80e072b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BAB6F7A.8000405@comcast.net> Has anyone even noticed which type of computer this is really. I checked about 300 images that I have saved and haven't matched it yet, so I'm stumped --unless this was photoshop'd too. Aside from the obvious bogus features, such as 28K Ram, it still does have 3.5" floppy drives, so it can be as early as 1982, which covers a lot of ground for microcomputers. =Dan From curt at atarimuseum.com Thu Mar 25 09:53:41 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 10:53:41 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <5f7d1b0e1003250653g40ce671fg48c8fa85b80e072b@mail.gmail.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <5f7d1b0e1003250653g40ce671fg48c8fa85b80e072b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BAB78F5.9040904@atarimuseum.com> Tell ya, that was damned good, got me cold - I bought that story fully, very believable, I just started digging around for Xalaga, its contact info, more history on the 117 computer and when nothing was showing up at all, that was when I was wondering, are these guys either so far off the grid that they had no marketing or what... but it was good, very good fool on me. Jason McBrien wrote: > The only "real" part of The Onion are it's media reviews, called the Onion > A.V. Club. It has really excellent music and movie reviews. > > Don't worry about getting fooled, Curt: > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Onion#The_Onion_taken_seriously > > The best is when Pravda reproduces Onion articles, nearly verbatim, as real > news from the U.S. > > > > > From pu1bzz.listas at gmail.com Thu Mar 25 09:51:28 2010 From: pu1bzz.listas at gmail.com (Alexandre Souza - Listas) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 11:51:28 -0300 Subject: Laugh, it's funny References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net><4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <5f7d1b0e1003250653g40ce671fg48c8fa85b80e072b@mail.gmail.com> <4BAB6F7A.8000405@comcast.net> Message-ID: <026f01cacc2b$40761160$0132a8c0@Alexandre> > Has anyone even noticed which type of computer this is really. I checked > about 300 images that I have saved and haven't matched it yet, so I'm > stumped --unless this was photoshop'd too. > Aside from the obvious bogus features, such as 28K Ram, it still does have > 3.5" floppy drives, so it can be as early as 1982, which covers a lot of > ground for microcomputers. It is easy to spot that this is a photo"chop" and/or bogus - 8" monitor - 3 1/2" drives Look at the drives besides the monitor. Have you seen door-operated 3 1/2" drives? What about the size of the monitor besides the drives? If the monitor is an 8" one, the drives are surely 5 1/4". And I found it not to be funny :) From curt at atarimuseum.com Thu Mar 25 09:54:20 2010 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 10:54:20 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BAB6F7A.8000405@comcast.net> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <5f7d1b0e1003250653g40ce671fg48c8fa85b80e072b@mail.gmail.com> <4BAB6F7A.8000405@comcast.net> Message-ID: <4BAB791C.7050403@atarimuseum.com> It looked similar to what someone mentioned about an Oki machine. Dan Roganti wrote: > > Has anyone even noticed which type of computer this is really. I > checked about 300 images that I have saved and haven't matched it yet, > so I'm stumped --unless this was photoshop'd too. > > Aside from the obvious bogus features, such as 28K Ram, it still does > have 3.5" floppy drives, so it can be as early as 1982, which covers a > lot of ground for microcomputers. > > =Dan > > From binarydinosaurs at gmail.com Thu Mar 25 10:01:53 2010 From: binarydinosaurs at gmail.com (Adrian Graham) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 15:01:53 +0000 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <4BAB791C.7050403@atarimuseum.com> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <5f7d1b0e1003250653g40ce671fg48c8fa85b80e072b@mail.gmail.com> <4BAB6F7A.8000405@comcast.net> <4BAB791C.7050403@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <53e388f21003250801y64cd2077ie932507aa982866d@mail.gmail.com> On 25 March 2010 14:54, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > It looked similar to what someone mentioned about an Oki machine. > > http://www.old-computers.com/MUSEUM/computer.asp?st=1&c=94 -- -- adrian/witchy Owner of Binary Dinosaurs, the UK's biggest home computer collection? www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk From jfoust at threedee.com Thu Mar 25 10:17:09 2010 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 10:17:09 -0500 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <6042667ECC9F44528BEC387CE68C477D@ANTONIOPC> References: <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> <6042667ECC9F44528BEC387CE68C477D@ANTONIOPC> Message-ID: <201003251522.o2PFMqTH072160@billY.EZWIND.NET> At 05:58 PM 3/24/2010, arcarlini at iee.org wrote: >It sounds like you've still missed a bit. The MTBF of 136 >years doesn't mean that your drive might last 136 years on >average, nor does it mean that if you buy 136 drives you >should expect one failure per year on average. There's a longer discussion on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTBF Do you have any disagreements or other interpretation of what's there? At 06:35 PM 3/24/2010, arcarlini at iee.org wrote: >Most modern drives support SMART ... and some of them (but not all) >even correctly count and report the number of power cycles. >UBCD has a range of disk diagnostic tools, modern Linux variants >have smarttools, you can track down any number of disk monitoring >tools for Windows. Lately I've been wondering about just how well SMART is monitored. Can the computer still read it if the drives are in a RAID? - John From dgahling at hotmail.com Thu Mar 25 10:44:11 2010 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 11:44:11 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <201003251522.o2PFMqTH072160@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <6042667ECC9F44528BEC387CE68C477D@ANTONIOPC>, <201003251522.o2PFMqTH072160@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: Normally, yes, the computer can see the SMART status even in a RAID. I've actually seen this a few times when a drive in a RAID started to fail. My original recommendation stands; If you want your stuff to last as long as possible, turn it off and leave it off for as long as possible Dan. > Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 10:17:09 -0500 > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > From: jfoust at threedee.com > Subject: RE: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > > At 05:58 PM 3/24/2010, arcarlini at iee.org wrote: > >It sounds like you've still missed a bit. The MTBF of 136 > >years doesn't mean that your drive might last 136 years on > >average, nor does it mean that if you buy 136 drives you > >should expect one failure per year on average. > > There's a longer discussion on Wikipedia: > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTBF > > Do you have any disagreements or other interpretation of what's there? > > At 06:35 PM 3/24/2010, arcarlini at iee.org wrote: > >Most modern drives support SMART ... and some of them (but not all) > >even correctly count and report the number of power cycles. > >UBCD has a range of disk diagnostic tools, modern Linux variants > >have smarttools, you can track down any number of disk monitoring > >tools for Windows. > > Lately I've been wondering about just how well SMART is monitored. > Can the computer still read it if the drives are in a RAID? > > - John > _________________________________________________________________ Check your Hotmail from your phone. http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9712957 From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Mar 25 10:53:11 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 09:53:11 -0600 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <6042667ECC9F44528BEC387CE68C477D@ANTONIOPC>, <201003251522.o2PFMqTH072160@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <4BAB86E7.8010304@jetnet.ab.ca> Dan Gahlinger wrote: > > Normally, yes, the computer can see the SMART status even in a RAID. > I've actually seen this a few times when a drive in a RAID started to fail. > > My original recommendation stands; > If you want your stuff to last as long as possible, > turn it off and leave it off for as long as possible > > Dan. Would that be unplugged too, with all the soft start items today like TV's and Computers? From ajp166 at verizon.net Thu Mar 25 10:57:22 2010 From: ajp166 at verizon.net (allison) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 11:57:22 -0400 Subject: Scrapping and re-use (was Re: Talking of old IBM systems) In-Reply-To: References: <6A86FD0F8CF14901A969B4522B879B88@RodsDevSystem> Message-ID: <4BAB87E2.8090803@verizon.net> Ethan Dicks wrote: > On 3/25/10, Rod Smallwood wrote: > >> Although I was working at DEC at the time I do not remember anything about >> scrapped boards being resold. >> > > I Worked for DEC from 83 to 93.. Located in MLO, PKO mostly as in Maynard. PMR was one of the locations an employee could go and buy scrap after they moved it from the mill. It moved from the mill for a reason. Seems material sold was often discards (material not being used) and not scrap. However the move also allowed tracking what was sold and who was buying. I built my first 11/23 from salvage and still have it. It's configuration was as field service would say, unsupportable, as nothing was meant to go together that way but could and did. > You were working in the UK, were you not? The stories I was hearing > were told to me at a DECUS in the late 1980s in Anaheim, presumably > about activities in the States. > > >> If they were in systems on Field Service >> contracts the ECO levels and where they had them, serial numbers would give >> them away. Even in those far off days systems were quite well documented. >> > > Certainly. There was also a lot of "self-maintenance" at the time, at > least in the US. If folks could not afford DEC Field Service, there > were third-party vendors galore to turn to for board-level spares. > When the company was doing well, most of our big machines were under > contract, but over time, more and more were allowed to lapse until I > was doing maintenance for 95% of what broke, just as an example. > > Any items from this stream were already gray-market before they hit > the streets. My understanding is that the arrangement was discovered > when the occasional naive customer attempted to get service for > something from DEC and the numbers didn't check out, so in the end the > system "worked", even if there was a gap for a time. > > >> If they were not under warranty and not under FS contract they would not >> have been considered DEC's problem. If they were manufacturing rejects they >> would have had the gold edge connectors cut off. >> > > There would have been plenty of salvageable stuff even if 100% of the > Qbus and Unibus boards had the fingers cut off before leaving the Mill > (though it's entirely possible the scrappers were originally cutting > those off themselves for gold recovery - it would have depended > entirely on the arrangements negotiated). Back in the early-to-mid > 1980s, intact system boards would have had a high potential resale > value, but practically any DEC part was bought and sold by third-party > vendors. Someone just took advantage of a situation, which was > corrected by shoving all the material through teeth that let nothing > bigger than a large postage stamp through. > > That happened way later. The reason salvage was moved out of the mill was there were a few bad apples refurbishing junk for sale and not one or two and the other was a bunch caught arranging for good material to end up as "salvage". Right after that salvage sales stopped completely. That was around 1986. Over they years there were stories and what I'd heard more first hand from a friend in security. Seems over the years you would get someone that thought they figured out how to get material for resale and would persue it. Usually they got caught or if not a few got move away from access and the problem would go away, and later they would too. The other was the true salvage market where used and junked systems were sold and outfit would break them up and sell the pieces or feed the second sourced spares market. Often the parts/modules were out of rev or worse bad. DEC did try to control that by making salvagers work under contract that they would destroy or reduce to small pieces unusable for remaking systems. This had two major effects. It made it harder for people that were making personal systems to find usable parts inexpensively or even new from DEC. The other was systems that would be considered rare or scarce that got into that system plain disappeared as trash. > But as you say, you were there and I wasn't, so the story is hardly > incontrovertible. It was already hearsay when I heard it 20ish years > ago. > > -ethan Some of it was never easy to ascertain what the details were or if true and some was known to be true. in the end theft, greed and corporate CYA resulted in a lot of material we'd gladly pay for then and now being scrapped. Allison From sttaylor at charter.net Thu Mar 25 11:13:15 2010 From: sttaylor at charter.net (ST Taylor_Charter) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 09:13:15 -0700 Subject: chemistry simulator on Apple ][? In-Reply-To: <3D3675A9-7ACB-4BA3-BA88-92C72201F53A@neurotica.com> References: <20100323192018.GA55779@silme.pair.com> <3D3675A9-7ACB-4BA3-BA88-92C72201F53A@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4BAB8B9B.9030509@charter.net> On 3/23/2010 3:07 PM, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 23, 2010, at 3:20 PM, Adam Goldman wrote: >>> A local friend is looking for an old chemistry simulator program >>> for the Apple ][. Here's his description: >>> >>>> I'm trying to find a "chemistry simulator" program that I used to play >>>> with on an Apple II way back in the day. I don't remember the name of >>>> it, but I remember being able to build a decent "lab" out of parts and >>>> pieces. I remember that the first lesson was an experiment to figure >>>> out why the fertilizer ship in Texas City exploded after an onboard >>>> fire. >> >> This was called Chem Lab, and I think it was published by Simon & >> Schuster. > > Fantastic, thanks! I'm looking for a copy, should anyone here have > it around somewhere. > > Thanks, > -Dave > Are you sure your friend isn't just interested in the answer to the first lesson! HA! HA! Maybe....... (You never know these days) From dgahling at hotmail.com Thu Mar 25 11:18:26 2010 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 12:18:26 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BAB86E7.8010304@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, , <6042667ECC9F44528BEC387CE68C477D@ANTONIOPC>, , <201003251522.o2PFMqTH072160@billY.EZWIND.NET>, , <4BAB86E7.8010304@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: Yeah definitely. I have my LCD tv on switchbox which I turn off when I leave. some of those things suck more power when they're off then they do on (scary!) Dan. > Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 09:53:11 -0600 > From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca > To: > Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > > Dan Gahlinger wrote: > > > > Normally, yes, the computer can see the SMART status even in a RAID. > > I've actually seen this a few times when a drive in a RAID started to fail. > > > > My original recommendation stands; > > If you want your stuff to last as long as possible, > > turn it off and leave it off for as long as possible > > > > Dan. > Would that be unplugged too, with all the soft start items > today like TV's and Computers? > _________________________________________________________________ Live connected with Messenger on your phone http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9712958 From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 25 11:44:57 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 09:44:57 -0700 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage In-Reply-To: <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com> References: , <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com> Message-ID: <4BAB3099.30537.607C3@cclist.sydex.com> On 25 Mar 2010 at 8:42, B Degnan wrote: > This is one of the original black connector versions of the IBM > 1904057 XM 407 display cards. It has 9114 RAMs in it, not socketed of > course, so I think if I can probe each RAM chip first to ID the bad > chip it'd be more efficient. I would similarly have to check the > 74L chips. oy! I know this is a stupid question, but have you scoped the sync signals from the card? --Chuck From emu at e-bbes.com Thu Mar 25 11:53:06 2010 From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 17:53:06 +0100 Subject: MIPS CPUs In-Reply-To: <4BAA7AF5.4030100@philpem.me.uk> References: <4BAA7AF5.4030100@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4BAB94F2.3000306@e-bbes.com> Philip Pemberton wrote: > I've got a few 'suspended projects' that would benefit from having a > reasonably fast (~100MHz would be nice, ideally with a bit of I-cache > and D-cache), 32-bit RISC CPU core with decent compiler/RTOS support. > Ucore seems to fit the bill (although there are reports that it doesn't > work properly) but the "older version" of the code has support for > instruction or data caching :( :( Did you check YARI ? From ragooman at comcast.net Thu Mar 25 12:51:15 2010 From: ragooman at comcast.net (Dan Roganti) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 13:51:15 -0400 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <026f01cacc2b$40761160$0132a8c0@Alexandre> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net><4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <5f7d1b0e1003250653g40ce671fg48c8fa85b80e072b@mail.gmail.com> <4BAB6F7A.8000405@comcast.net> <026f01cacc2b$40761160$0132a8c0@Alexandre> Message-ID: <4BABA293.9050706@comcast.net> Alexandre Souza - Listas wrote: > > It is easy to spot that this is a photo"chop" and/or bogus > > - 8" monitor > - 3 1/2" drives > > Look at the drives besides the monitor. Have you seen door-operated > 3 1/2" drives? What about the size of the monitor besides the drives? > If the monitor is an 8" one, the drives are surely 5 1/4". After checking the scale in the image, given that is a standard size keyboard, a 5-1/4" floppy slot is the same length as 7 keys --so it's definitely not 3-1/2" . And a 8" monitor is about the length of 11 keys. So these specs are all fictitious. Although this machine could still exist if when the correct features are described. =Dan From billdeg at degnanco.com Thu Mar 25 14:00:43 2010 From: billdeg at degnanco.com (B Degnan) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 15:00:43 -0400 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double image In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BABB2DB.5080102@degnanco.com> >> > This is one of the original black connector versions of the IBM >> > 1904057 XM 407 display cards. It has 9114 RAMs in it, not socketed of >> > course, so I think if I can probe each RAM chip first to ID the bad >> > chip it'd be more efficient. I would similarly have to check the >> > 74L chips. oy! >> > > I know this is a stupid question, but have you scoped the sync > signals from the card? > > --Chuck > > No, I did not. Unfortunately this is not my forte. Bill From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Thu Mar 25 14:01:23 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 19:01:23 -0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) References: <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de>, <6042667ECC9F44528BEC387CE68C477D@ANTONIOPC>, <201003251522.o2PFMqTH072160@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <010801cacc50$0ad98d00$cb655f0a@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Dan Gahlinger" > To: > Sent: Thursday, March 25, 2010 3:44 PM > Subject: RE: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > > > Normally, yes, the computer can see the SMART status even in a RAID. > I've actually seen this a few times when a drive in a RAID started to fail. > > My original recommendation stands; > If you want your stuff to last as long as possible, > turn it off and leave it off for as long as possible > > Dan. > So don't use it? :( Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 25 13:36:41 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:36:41 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <6dbe3c381003241417g315c2a6ala732c2f5b7859c28@mail.gmail.com> from "Brian Lanning" at Mar 24, 10 04:17:48 pm Message-ID: > > Well, considering my 80x86-based laptop (which is over 20 years > > old) runs for well over 10 hours before needeing a charge.... > > > > [Of coruse it does't have a backlit display. or a colour display, or > > internal disk drives. You don't use it to watch movies. The memory is row > > after row of 6264s, the battery islead-acid. No prizes for guessing what > > it is] > > > > > An HP Omnibook? That had a really long battery life. Although now that I Right manufacturer, but not that machine. Didn;t the Omnibook have an intenral 'kittyhawk' hard drive? -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 25 13:38:50 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:38:50 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <2B83A6A6-3113-4A69-B84E-9ABFD8176331@mail.msu.edu> from "Josh Dersch" at Mar 24, 10 02:22:09 pm Message-ID: > > Well, considering my 80x86-based laptop (which is over 20 years > > old) runs for well over 10 hours before needeing a charge.... > > > > [Of coruse it does't have a backlit display. or a colour display, or > > internal disk drives. You don't use it to watch movies. The memory > > is row > > after row of 6264s, the battery islead-acid. No prizes for guessing > > what > > it is] > > > And it must be so fun to lug around (or use on one's lap) with that > lead-acid battery :). I'm guessing my netbook could run for quite a > time were I willing to lug a car battery around with it :). Oh come on... It's not a car battery, it's 3 2.5Ah Cyclon cells. And the batteryt comparies favourably in amss with other similar-capacity batteries of the time. I do however refuse to call the Amstrad PPC640 a 'Laptop'. That machine is wider than a PDP11. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 25 13:42:26 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:42:26 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Reusing old floppy *drives* In-Reply-To: <4BAA21F3.17007.15330A4@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 24, 10 02:30:11 pm Message-ID: > > On 24 Mar 2010 at 21:05, Tony Duell wrote: > > > I am not sure it applies to all FD235s -- Teac are well-known for > > producing very different drives with slightly different model numbers > > I am well aware of that. Many earlier models do not have this, but > the ones I described--the later ones with only a drive-select jumper > generally do. Between various models, the jumpers are located in > various places on the boards. For uniformity's sake, I like the 6xxx > series of 235HF and have a couple of cartons of those yet. Enough to > meet foreseeable needs. I am pretty sure I haev the service manual suplements for the 6xxx series. And I think all the spindle motors used on thsoe had the speed cotnrol line. It should be _possiuble_ to change the speed on the older drives. Sicne the data rate remains unchanged there would be no changes to the read filter, etc. Jsut ot the motor itseldf. You may find the motor control chip has a speed control pin, or you could change the ceramic resonator, I think. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 25 13:50:37 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:50:37 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BAA2268.6986.154FA19@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 24, 10 02:32:08 pm Message-ID: > > On 24 Mar 2010 at 20:48, Tony Duell wrote: > > > [Of coruse it does't have a backlit display. or a colour display, or > > internal disk drives. You don't use it to watch movies. The memory is > > row after row of 6264s, the battery islead-acid. No prizes for > > guessing what it is] > > HP-110? I seem to remember seeing a pack of Gates D-sized lead-acid > cells in the battery compartment of one. Close enopugh :-). I do have an HP110, but I normally use one of the pair of Portable+ machines that I also own. They all run off a 6V lead-acid battery. The service manual shows a battery pack consiting of 3 Cyclon cells, many of the machines actually contain a Panasonic block battery. The former are easier to obtain and what I generally use for replacements. The Portable+ has a few advantages over the 110. The first is a larger display (full 24 lines) and a connector inside that carries enough of the display lines to connect to an external composite video interface [1]. The second is that it takes 2 optional 'drawers', one at each side. In both my machiens, one coatains more RAM (there's over 800K of RAm in there -- over 100 6264 chips), The other contains ROM sockets and can be used as a read-only disk. If you want a real disk drive you can link up an 9114 floppy drive or (something which is not commonly known) an SS/80 or Amigo drive using an HP82169 interface module. [1] Tjhis consists of an HP ASIC and 16K of SRAM. It's rare, but I managed to find one, and the interface connector panel for the Portable+ All _I_ need in a laptop is a terminal emulator and a text editor. A spreadsheet is useful. My Portable+ has all those in ROMs. A couple of years back I needed to display wome output from an HP9830 on a laege scrren. The set up was an HP11205 RS232 interface in the 9830, linked to the Portable+ running a VT100 emulator, then the video interface I mentioned linked to the composite input on a borrowed video projector. Worked perfectly... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 25 13:58:19 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:58:19 +0000 (GMT) Subject: OT: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100324161518.O38426@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Mar 24, 10 04:21:27 pm Message-ID: > There is a little test jig that is sometimes used, that holds diagonal > corners of the die between centers, for a spin. If the die reverses > direction of rotation right before it settles to a stop, then it fails. The 'Pviot test for loads'. There are several other ways to make dice show numbers with the 'wrong' prboabiltiy, though. Totakky OT, byut 'Scarne on Dice' has a couple of chapters on this. (No, I don't gamble, but I happen to have said book on my bookshelf) -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 25 14:02:02 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 19:02:02 +0000 (GMT) Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double image In-Reply-To: from "dwight elvey" at Mar 24, 10 04:51:36 pm Message-ID: > I might have just ran a wire through the hole and tacked it onto the > pin. > This really depends on who I was doing this for. If for a customer=2C > I'd have replaced the chip. If for me=2C as I stated=2C I'd most like not > even bothered to remove the part. It is my experience that desoldering and resoldering a chip (DIL, SOIC, PQFP, etc) does not significantly reduce reliability. Many times I've desodlerd a chip for some reason, and then soldered it back, and only very rarely does that part fail first (or second or....). -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 25 14:04:28 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 19:04:28 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100325012410.GD25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> from "Alexander Schreiber" at Mar 25, 10 02:24:10 am Message-ID: > And I've got a machine that operates for weeks of moderate daily use > on two AA cells. As have I, but I did say 'laptop' and not 'palmtop' :-). > > > [Of coruse it does't have a backlit display. or a colour display, or > > internal disk drives. You don't use it to watch movies. > > Same with the above mentioned machine. It is also not exactly the most > powerful machine around. But if you want modern hardware capabilities, > then one of the prices you've got to pay is a power consumption of quite > a bit more than a few hundred mW. Fortunately, these old machines do everything I need... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Mar 25 14:09:55 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 19:09:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage In-Reply-To: <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com> from "B Degnan" at Mar 25, 10 08:42:46 am Message-ID: > Thanks for the feedback. I am using a standard IBM monochrome monitor. > I tested the monitor with another known-working card, and I also tried > another monitor. The problem is with the display card. > > This is one of the original black connector versions of the IBM 1904057 I wasn;t aware there were several versions. What are the _real_ differences? > XM 407 display cards. It has 9114 RAMs in it, not socketed of course, > so I think if I can probe each RAM chip first to ID the bad chip it'd be > more efficient. I would similarly have to check the 74L chips. oy! I don;t think there are any 74Lxxx parts on that board, if there are, be careful. A number of 74Lxxx chips ahave different pinouts ot the 74xxx/74LSxxxx versions, as people who work on HP9800s will discover :-) I think I'd run a logic probe on the address pins of the RAMs. All should be changing (due to the scan counters in teh 6845). If any are stuck, then either a RAM has an internal shrt, or there's a problem wit hte address multiplexer or the 6845 itself. -tony From brianlanning at gmail.com Thu Mar 25 14:32:23 2010 From: brianlanning at gmail.com (Brian Lanning) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 14:32:23 -0500 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <6dbe3c381003241417g315c2a6ala732c2f5b7859c28@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6dbe3c381003251232p7e2cc609i611f885aa3c6a892@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 1:36 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > > An HP Omnibook? That had a really long battery life. Although now that I > > Right manufacturer, but not that machine. Didn;t the Omnibook have an > intenral 'kittyhawk' hard drive? > > I was thinking of this one: http://www.hpmuseum.net/display_item.php?hw=123 I had forgotten that there was a hard drive model. I was thinking of the flash memory version. Apparently there was a no internal storage version as well. I wouldn't mind getting my hands on one of these again. brian From arcarlini at iee.org Thu Mar 25 14:19:00 2010 From: arcarlini at iee.org (arcarlini at iee.org) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 19:19:00 -0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <201003251522.o2PFMqTH072160@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <63B4ABD1DC744951998792ECE4555F17@ANTONIOPC> John Foust [jfoust at threedee.com]: > > There's a longer discussion on Wikipedia: > >http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTBF > > Do you have any disagreements or other interpretation of what's there? I think it's mostly accurate although it hides the detail in that "renewal process" link. This link http://www.rpi.edu/~sofkam/fileserverdisks.html points to an original IBM paper "MTBF---A measure of OEM disk drive reliability" which I've read before but cannot find now (the link supplied is dead). My original information comes from an MTBF whitepaper by either Seagate or WD ... but I cannot find that either :-) Antonio From derschjo at mail.msu.edu Thu Mar 25 14:42:51 2010 From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 12:42:51 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5F2F91FA-9CD9-469E-8571-D7CA8D43A03C@mail.msu.edu> On Mar 25, 2010, at 11:38 AM, ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote: >>> Well, considering my 80x86-based laptop (which is over 20 years >>> old) runs for well over 10 hours before needeing a charge.... >>> >>> [Of coruse it does't have a backlit display. or a colour display, or >>> internal disk drives. You don't use it to watch movies. The memory >>> is row >>> after row of 6264s, the battery islead-acid. No prizes for guessing >>> what >>> it is] >> >> >> And it must be so fun to lug around (or use on one's lap) with that >> lead-acid battery :). I'm guessing my netbook could run for quite a >> time were I willing to lug a car battery around with it :). > > Oh come on... It's not a car battery, it's 3 2.5Ah Cyclon cells. And > the > batteryt comparies favourably in amss with other similar-capacity > batteries of the time. I was thinking more of the battery in the original Mac Portable (which I know is not what you're referring to). The portable weighed 16lbs, due in no small part to the lead-acid battery it used. I guess it's technically not a laptop, but it was definitely not in the same class as, say, the Compaq portable. :) - Josh > > I do however refuse to call the Amstrad PPC640 a 'Laptop'. That > machine > is wider than a PDP11. > > -tony > From als at thangorodrim.de Thu Mar 25 15:18:43 2010 From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 21:18:43 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <201003251522.o2PFMqTH072160@billY.EZWIND.NET> References: <20100324204211.GA25172@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> <6042667ECC9F44528BEC387CE68C477D@ANTONIOPC> <201003251522.o2PFMqTH072160@billY.EZWIND.NET> Message-ID: <20100325201843.GA6212@mordor.angband.thangorodrim.de> On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 10:17:09AM -0500, John Foust wrote: > At 06:35 PM 3/24/2010, arcarlini at iee.org wrote: > >Most modern drives support SMART ... and some of them (but not all) > >even correctly count and report the number of power cycles. > >UBCD has a range of disk diagnostic tools, modern Linux variants > >have smarttools, you can track down any number of disk monitoring > >tools for Windows. > > Lately I've been wondering about just how well SMART is monitored. > Can the computer still read it if the drives are in a RAID? That depends very much how the RAID is set up. With software RAID: no problem, as the OS sees the raw disks. With hardware RAID it very much depends on the RAID controller wether you can get access to the SMART data for individual disks. Regards, Alex. -- "Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." -- Thomas A. Edison From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 25 15:49:21 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 20:49:21 +0000 Subject: MIPS CPUs In-Reply-To: <4BAB94F2.3000306@e-bbes.com> References: <4BAA7AF5.4030100@philpem.me.uk> <4BAB94F2.3000306@e-bbes.com> Message-ID: <4BABCC51.6060706@philpem.me.uk> e.stiebler wrote: > Did you check YARI ? You mean this? http://yari.thorn.ws/YARI/Status.html Well it's cached, but doesn't have any support for Supervisor mode or the WISHBONE bus, which means I'll (at the very least) have to write a bus translator if I want to make it talk to a WISHBONE-compliant device. The shared instruction/data bus is a nice addition -- will be nice to get rid of the bus arbitration logic. The lack of an illegal instruction trap is somewhat concerning, though... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 25 16:41:58 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 14:41:58 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <4BAA2268.6986.154FA19@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 24, 10 02:32:08 pm, Message-ID: <4BAB7636.8333.115F2F7@cclist.sydex.com> On 25 Mar 2010 at 18:50, Tony Duell wrote: > Close enopugh :-). I do have an HP110, but I normally use one of the > pair of Portable+ machines that I also own. They all run off a 6V > lead-acid battery. The service manual shows a battery pack consiting > of 3 Cyclon cells, many of the machines actually contain a Panasonic > block battery. The former are easier to obtain and what I generally > use for replacements. Now, that's where your "20 year" statement fails. LCD displays in the day of the Portable Plus were horrible. I almost bought a DG One laptop until I discovered that the full-size display was completely illegible. I wound up with a Grid, but even that display made a better night-light than it did an output device. Recently, I ran across an advertising blurb for a uC evaluation board that used a small OLED display. Who knows? In 20 years, the LCD may be just a faint memory. --Chuck From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Thu Mar 25 16:25:18 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 21:25:18 -0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com><4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca><017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa><4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa>, <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com>, <015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <001201cacc66$0c616380$89fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Dan Gahlinger" > To: > Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2010 11:02 PM > Subject: RE: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > > > I got news for you buddy, > > your original laptop battery was made in china too! That's interesting, as it clearly states "made in *Japan*" on it. > so stop slamming them, all your equipment is made there. I'm not slamming *all* of China, but alot of counterfeit products are made there. > > as for how long they last, anyone who tells you 8 hours is full of it. > maybe 2-3 hours on a good day. > unless you're watching videos, or playing games, etc... even then maybe 2 hours. Well, PC World states a brand new battery would last for 4 hours: http://pcworld.about.com/news/Feb122002id83366.htm Given that we often use a laptop at work for displaying powerpoint slides (via electronic projector thingy - not the old style selephane one which uses a mirror to do the projecting) and our meetings last about an hour *and* the battery percentage rarely dips below 90% in that timeframe I would suggest that batteries can last a long time. Obviously, CPU intensive work (video and 3D graphics) would bring that down. > > but if the power specs don't line up, yeah, bad idea, no matter where you bought it. > Yeah. I check them carefully. > there are tricks on the net to deep discharge batteries, and sometimes that brings them > back, > wipes the ni-cad memory. deep discharge? What do you mean by this? > > as for sleep, screen savers, or leave them on.... bzzzzzt... > > turn them off as much as humanly possible. your system will last longer. > > My primary pc is now about 8 years old and going strong, never had to replace a thing. > I regularly clean out the fans, and the case (dust bunnies, ewww). > Well, this laptop has been used almost daily for the past 3 years and 1 month. > AND if you're a smoker... well... yer system is hosed... sorry. > I'm not a smoker, and having had asthma as a kid it would be foolish for me to do so. > get a hepa filter in the room, it'll help. > > Dan. > Not much room for anything else in here, and given the small hole in the wall (aerial cable direct to my bedroom - normal one goes straight downstairs) I think it would be a bit pointless. Kinda like having the fire on in winter with the front door wide open! Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Thu Mar 25 16:42:09 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 21:42:09 -0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com><015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BAA32C3.5050102@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <001301cacc66$0e22c290$89fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ray Arachelian" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Wednesday, March 24, 2010 3:41 PM Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) > Andrew Burton wrote: > > Now you see theres the other problem. This is an old 2nd-hand laptop and the > > internal battery is all but gone - it lasts about 5 minutes after the laptop > > as been switched on. When I got it the battery lasted about 40 minutes. > > Foolishly, I got a replacement from China. I haven't used the replacement as > > i) it looks suspicious too me (and being from China is probably fake/faulty) > > and ii) the power ratings on it differ to my official battery and I wouldn't > > want anything to happen to my laptop. > > > You could have mentioned this earlier and saved a lot of messages. :) > Sorry, my slip up. Feel free to throw tomatoes at me! > > If the voltage ratings are the same, and the pins for the battery are > the same and it fits, there's no reason not to try it. It might have a > larger capacity than the original. Just make sure the voltage is the same. > Here are the specs: Original battery -------------------- Dell Battery Module Type 75UYF Rechargeable Li-Ion Rating 14.8V - 3800 mAh Charging Current 3.5A Made In Japan Replace with type: 1691P, 5081P, 53977, 3149C New battery ---------------- No manufacturer name, logo or country of manufacture Equivalent part numbers: 66WHR, 312-0009, 312-3250, 1691P, 5081P, 53977, 3149C and a few others Li-Ion Rating 14.8V - 4460 mAh I am a little disturbed that theres no manufacturer name or logo, plus it doesn't state rechargeable. Is it safe to assume it is rechargeable? I compared the two batteries. Physically they are almost identical. The connector slot (which can be seen in the picture here: http://www.digi163.com/battery/DELL-laptop-battery/Dell-Latitude-C610-battery.htm ) is slightly different on the newer one. It's the same design but the gaps between the connectors is visibly smaller, only by maybe a millimetre or so. The voltages are the same so I'll give it a try over the weekend. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Thu Mar 25 17:10:14 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 22:10:14 +0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BABDF46.8050907@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: > I do however refuse to call the Amstrad PPC640 a 'Laptop'. That machine > is wider than a PDP11. My friend described one of those (a PPC640, not a PDP) as a "luggable". As in "you could probably lug it from place to place, but it's not exactly practical". -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From ray at arachelian.com Thu Mar 25 19:03:01 2010 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 20:03:01 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on...and notebook batteries. In-Reply-To: <001301cacc66$0e22c290$89fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com><015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BAA32C3.5050102@arachelian.com> <001301cacc66$0e22c290$89fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <4BABF9B5.6040906@arachelian.com> Andrew Burton wrote: > Sorry, my slip up. Feel free to throw tomatoes at me! > Nah, that would be wasteful. Besides, sliced with some fresh mozzarella and basil, they're just too tasty. > Here are the specs: > > Original battery > -------------------- > Dell Battery Module Type 75UYF > Rechargeable Li-Ion > Rating 14.8V - 3800 mAh > Charging Current 3.5A > Made In Japan > > Replace with type: 1691P, 5081P, 53977, 3149C > > > New battery > ---------------- > No manufacturer name, logo or country of manufacture > Equivalent part numbers: 66WHR, 312-0009, 312-3250, 1691P, 5081P, 53977, > 3149C and a few others > Li-Ion > Rating 14.8V - 4460 mAh > It's perfectly fine, and that's a better battery than the original. > > I am a little disturbed that theres no manufacturer name or logo, plus it > doesn't state rechargeable. Is it safe to assume it is rechargeable? > Come on now, it's for a notebook computer, do you expect it to be alkaline or zinc carbon? :-) > I compared the two batteries. Physically they are almost identical. The > connector slot (which can be seen in the picture here: > http://www.digi163.com/battery/DELL-laptop-battery/Dell-Latitude-C610-battery.htm ) is slightly different on the newer one. It's the same design but the > gaps between the connectors is visibly smaller, only by maybe a millimetre > or so. The voltages are the same so I'll give it a try over the weekend. > Yup, give it a try. odds are it'll work just fine. Long as it fits, it should work. I have a similar replacement situation for my older macbook pro. Not made by apple, but I've tried it and it works just fine despite the higher mAh rating, just like yours. BTW, if you're not going to travel with the notebook much, you can still use the old battery even if it only lasts 5 minutes. In this case, it'll work as if it were a UPS. The reason I say this is that if you keep a battery in a notebook and you don't discharge it once in a while you'll find it will die pretty quickly. If you're going to travel around with it, use the new battery. Make sure you charge up the new battery before putting it away, and something like every 3-6 months you should pop it back in and recharge it. If the charge goes completely to zero (deep discharge) the battery is dead and will never be recoverable. I don't know about dells, or that particular one, but I killed the battery in my old macbook pro two years ago by leaving the machine on 24x7 for about a month (I was inbetween jobs, previously to that, the machine traveled with me). After that, it could barely hold half an hour - usually less, and it would power off before fully discharging - despite resetting the PMU and doing a few discharge/charge cycles. Odds are dells are better than this, for sure Thinkpads do not have this issue, but old Macbook pros with the swapable battery suffer from this. I've removed the battery from that machine completely now as I don't use it anywhere nearly as much. But every 3-6 months I recharge it and allow it to discharge, then recharge it again just to make sure I keep it alive. From lproven at gmail.com Thu Mar 25 19:54:35 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 00:54:35 +0000 Subject: Laugh, it's funny In-Reply-To: <026f01cacc2b$40761160$0132a8c0@Alexandre> References: <4BA962DD.9090509@snarc.net> <4BA96FFB.8080308@atarimuseum.com> <1debc0351003231854m41afdb14x2fabdac6ee78adc0@mail.gmail.com> <2b1f1f551003231858xd1651cat1c8e97fc8ab7a4dd@mail.gmail.com> <5f7d1b0e1003250653g40ce671fg48c8fa85b80e072b@mail.gmail.com> <4BAB6F7A.8000405@comcast.net> <026f01cacc2b$40761160$0132a8c0@Alexandre> Message-ID: <575131af1003251754g3bf748bfpf643550cc72d172d@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 2:51 PM, Alexandre Souza - Listas wrote: > ? And I found it not to be funny :) Yes, that's my normal reaction to The Onion, as well. -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From lproven at gmail.com Thu Mar 25 19:58:49 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 00:58:49 +0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <5F2F91FA-9CD9-469E-8571-D7CA8D43A03C@mail.msu.edu> References: <5F2F91FA-9CD9-469E-8571-D7CA8D43A03C@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: <575131af1003251758k2e5e5226t6ebc486b349f60a8@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 7:42 PM, Josh Dersch wrote: > I was thinking more of the battery in the original Mac Portable (which I > know is not what you're referring to). ?The portable weighed 16lbs, due in > no small part to the lead-acid battery it used. ?I guess it's technically > not a laptop, but it was definitely not in the same class as, say, the > Compaq portable. :) Yes, that was my guess, too. Only laptop-/style/ portable I ever even heard of with a lead-acid battery. *Gorgeous* monochrome active-matrix LCD, too. Stunning for its time, still good today. But a bit too modern for Tony! I mean, it has a GUI and everything. 1989 was just yesterday... http://lowendmac.com/pb/macintosh-portable.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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From teoz at neo.rr.com Thu Mar 25 20:56:27 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 21:56:27 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) References: <5F2F91FA-9CD9-469E-8571-D7CA8D43A03C@mail.msu.edu> <575131af1003251758k2e5e5226t6ebc486b349f60a8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: ----- Original Message ----- From: "Liam Proven" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Thursday, March 25, 2010 8:58 PM Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 7:42 PM, Josh Dersch wrote: > I was thinking more of the battery in the original Mac Portable (which I > know is not what you're referring to). The portable weighed 16lbs, due in > no small part to the lead-acid battery it used. I guess it's technically > not a laptop, but it was definitely not in the same class as, say, the > Compaq portable. :) Yes, that was my guess, too. Only laptop-/style/ portable I ever even heard of with a lead-acid battery. *Gorgeous* monochrome active-matrix LCD, too. Stunning for its time, still good today. Tandy FD1100FD. Green LCD (CGA), lead acid battery From cclist at sydex.com Thu Mar 25 21:25:16 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 19:25:16 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: , Message-ID: <4BABB89C.26878.21954E2@cclist.sydex.com> On 25 Mar 2010 at 21:56, Teo Zenios wrote: > Yes, that was my guess, too. Only laptop-/style/ portable I ever even > heard of with a lead-acid battery. *Gorgeous* monochrome active-matrix > LCD, too. Stunning for its time, still good today. I've got a Smith-Corona PWP-7000LT word processor that resembles the HP110 in size and general appearance. It uses lead-acid batteries also, but has a backlight to the LCD screen, for all the good it does. BTW, the battery still holds a charge after more than 20 years. Try that with your lithium-ion battery. A nickel-iron battery would be even better, but I'm not aware of any portable device with one. --Chuck From jdbryan at acm.org Thu Mar 25 22:01:16 2010 From: jdbryan at acm.org (J. David Bryan) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 23:01:16 -0400 Subject: HP 64000 relocatable file format / assembler In-Reply-To: <4BAB44BF.9030603@philpem.me.uk> References: <4BAA7992.1030006@philpem.me.uk>, , <4BAB44BF.9030603@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: On Thursday, March 25, 2010 at 11:10, Philip Pemberton wrote: > I can get the checksum for the NAME record to match up perfectly, then > there's a DOUBLE record after that. The checksum for that NEVER > matches up and I can't find the criteria for making it do so. The relocatable files produced by the 10391 IA have a null EXTERNAL record in between the NAME and the first DOUBLE record. The record is two words: 0004 (record ID) and 0004 (checksum). Is it possible that you're overlooking that? I've never encountered any checksum errors with the output of the IA. > I'll have a look at that -- for now, all my IAL files have been > assembled in C:\IA, so the filenames are quite short ("C:\IA\I8085.S" > as an example; 13 characters plus the null). I don't know whether the logic analyzer you're using cares or not, but the 64000 NAME format uses a length byte and blank-pads the fixed-length filename, rather than using a null terminator. -- Dave From rodsmallwood at btconnect.com Fri Mar 26 00:59:48 2010 From: rodsmallwood at btconnect.com (Rod Smallwood) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 05:59:48 -0000 Subject: Scrapping and re-use (was Re: Talking of old IBM systems) In-Reply-To: References: <6A86FD0F8CF14901A969B4522B879B88@RodsDevSystem> Message-ID: <1C69062DAE0844F88F68E7FC30A21563@RodsDevSystem> Hi a few things to add. 1. Working in the? UK well sort of. 2. A couple of weeks in the UK, a week in the US and a week in Europe would be an average month. 3. By then DEC had plants world wide. Marlboro (Mass), Westfield Mass, Nashua (New Hampshire), Phoenix (Ariz), Puerto Rico, Kanata (Canada), Galway (Ireland). Lots of scope for scrap leakage there 4. By then there was no longer anything made in the mill and the head office had moved to Parker Street. 5. I can remember the Parker Street car park. Full except for a battered Pinto with an empty space front and back and one to each side. Yes it was Ken Olsen's car. I remember Ken addressing a meeting with the old line about 'my door is always open' He was being truthful; His office did not have a door. He had the usual set up for a manager. Outer office for a secretary and an inside door to the inner office. He sat in the outer office (without a door) which gave onto the general open plan area and his secretary had the inner one. His phone was on his desk he answered it himself if was in. Regards Rod Smallwood -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Ethan Dicks Sent: 25 March 2010 13:47 To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Scrapping and re-use (was Re: Talking of old IBM systems) On 3/25/10, Rod Smallwood wrote: > > Although I was working at DEC at the time I do not remember anything about > scrapped boards being resold. You were working in the UK, were you not? The stories I was hearing were told to me at a DECUS in the late 1980s in Anaheim, presumably about activities in the States. > If they were in systems on Field Service > contracts the ECO levels and where they had them, serial numbers would give > them away. Even in those far off days systems were quite well documented. Certainly. There was also a lot of "self-maintenance" at the time, at least in the US. If folks could not afford DEC Field Service, there were third-party vendors galore to turn to for board-level spares. When the company was doing well, most of our big machines were under contract, but over time, more and more were allowed to lapse until I was doing maintenance for 95% of what broke, just as an example. Any items from this stream were already gray-market before they hit the streets. My understanding is that the arrangement was discovered when the occasional naive customer attempted to get service for something from DEC and the numbers didn't check out, so in the end the system "worked", even if there was a gap for a time. > If they were not under warranty and not under FS contract they would not > have been considered DEC's problem. If they were manufacturing rejects they > would have had the gold edge connectors cut off. There would have been plenty of salvageable stuff even if 100% of the Qbus and Unibus boards had the fingers cut off before leaving the Mill (though it's entirely possible the scrappers were originally cutting those off themselves for gold recovery - it would have depended entirely on the arrangements negotiated). Back in the early-to-mid 1980s, intact system boards would have had a high potential resale value, but practically any DEC part was bought and sold by third-party vendors. Someone just took advantage of a situation, which was corrected by shoving all the material through teeth that let nothing bigger than a large postage stamp through. But as you say, you were there and I wasn't, so the story is hardly incontrovertible. It was already hearsay when I heard it 20ish years ago. -ethan From pinball at telus.net Thu Mar 25 12:33:51 2010 From: pinball at telus.net (John Robertson) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 10:33:51 -0700 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage In-Reply-To: <4BAB3099.30537.607C3@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com> <4BAB3099.30537.607C3@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4BAB9E7F.8060302@telus.net> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 25 Mar 2010 at 8:42, B Degnan wrote: > > >> This is one of the original black connector versions of the IBM >> 1904057 XM 407 display cards. It has 9114 RAMs in it, not socketed of >> course, so I think if I can probe each RAM chip first to ID the bad >> chip it'd be more efficient. I would similarly have to check the >> 74L chips. oy! >> > > I know this is a stupid question, but have you scoped the sync > signals from the card? > > --Chuck > > > I'm with Chuck, this sounds like a clock issue to me too. John :-#)# -- John's Jukes Ltd. 2343 Main St., Vancouver, BC, Canada V5T 3C9 Call (604)872-5757 or Fax 872-2010 (Pinballs, Jukes, VideoGames) www.flippers.com "Old pinballers never die, they just flip out" From hachti at hachti.de Fri Mar 26 02:05:28 2010 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 08:05:28 +0100 Subject: Desperately Looking for Honeywell DDP-516 documentation Message-ID: <4BAC5CB8.9020504@hachti.de> Hi Folks, I recently came across a Honeywell DDP-516 computer. I'm currently resurrecting the system. That basically means assembling the pieces I got and fixing minor issues. The most work comes from missing mounting hardware :-( The system came with a paper tape reader interface. And a paper tape punch interface. I have schematics for the reader interface. --- But I'm desperately looking for the paper tape punch interface schematics! Does anyone have these? Al? Bill? CHM? Someone else? There's also another DDP-516 owner who would like to get hold of these schematics. I have no information about that interface. Only the programming interface is known. And it is not the same interface module as used in the H316. The H316 interface has PTP and PTR in one and uses completely different ?PACs. BTW: I could need some spare ?PACs to fix a memory (so far at least one CM006). Will write a separate post after having checked out the system, listing all I'm looking for. Best wishes, Philipp :-) -- http://www.hachti.de From jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de Fri Mar 26 02:24:10 2010 From: jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de (Jochen Kunz) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 08:24:10 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <544087B3B7684DD38A112CE31CE219BD@dell8300> Message-ID: <20100326082410.b38778e9.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> On Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:33:23 +0000 (GMT) ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote: > Another very common one is that the startup resistor of a switch-mode PSU > goes open-circuit while the machine is left on The PSU keeps working as > long as the mains is there, but if it gets turned off, or the mains > fails, of course it won't restart. > > Some terminal servers and the like were very prone to this problem. > > It's a very easy fix once you know which resistor to check. The PSU of the HP9000 C240 / C360 are prone to this. A few friends and I had that problem. Several dead machines that would start only sometimes when pluged in. Verry frustrating. Eventually a friend took a weekend to reverse engineer the PSU and finaly found the faulty resistor. We changed that resistor on all of our machines and they work flawlessly since then. -- tsch??, Jochen Homepage: http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/ From jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de Fri Mar 26 02:49:42 2010 From: jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de (Jochen Kunz) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 08:49:42 +0100 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: <20100323090051.6c5aea59.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> Message-ID: <20100326084942.84bc4283.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> On Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:27:18 +0000 (GMT) ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote: > For an awful lot of applications you don't need more power than an old 8 > bit processor IMHO. Think of the large number of small PICs, 8051s, etc > thatare are in use. Sure. That's the reason why 8 bit controllers are still in large quantity production and new models come to the market. The point is: 30 years back there was no 32 bit 50 MHz controller available, that cost only as much as a high end 8 bitter. So you where limited when you actually needed that compute power. > > get away with a small 8 bit controller you want a high integrated > > single chip solution. At least I do. A single Atmel AVR with ISP > > programmer is so much more comfortable to use, cheaper and faster to > > deploy then a whole board filled with CPU, RAM, ROM, IO, ... A single > > chip solution will work out of the box. A discrete CPU, RAM, ROM, > No it doesn;t, you have to write the firmware :-). Amd that is the problem. Yes, that is exactely the problem. With a single chip solution I can start to address the real problem right away. I don't need to care about peripheral problems like wiring up a CPU, RAM, ROM, IO, ... first. If you design a large quantity product, a single chip solution will reduce cost by a gread amount. > > IO, ... solution needs lots of debuging in itself before I can start to > > address the real problem. > Eh? A simple microcprocessor + ROM + RAM + a couple of I/O chips will > work first time. It doesn't need to be debugged. It needs to be debugged. At least when it is build by me. Belive me. ;-) > Seriously, there are places where they are the right thing to use. And > there are places where they are not. However, all to often so-called > designmrs want to solcve every problem with a mircocontroller... Designers talk the language they are familar with. Today most disigners are more familar with C then with BC548. ;-) > > sophisticated mechatronical system. Not to talk about anti-lock brake > > system... This is somthing I definitely want as it saves my money and > > enhances safety. But you can't do this with a 8085. > The total cost of a car is not primarily the cost of the fuel IMHO. > Considerign the fuel economy from electronic engine management doesn't > seem to be that great (based on the cars I've worked on -- I don't > drive), and considerign they are much more expensive for me to repair, I > am not at all convinced it will save me money in the end. A highly optimized combustion process not only saves fuel but also reduces toxic emissions. It can reduce wear on the engine. An anti-lock brake system and air-bags enhance safety, they can even save your live. -- tsch??, Jochen Homepage: http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/ From pontus at Update.UU.SE Fri Mar 26 05:15:53 2010 From: pontus at Update.UU.SE (Pontus Pihlgren) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 11:15:53 +0100 Subject: DECTalk DTC01 Message-ID: <20100326101553.GA29239@Update.UU.SE> Hi All. I've become curious about the different DECTalk devices. There seems to have been a number of variants. The stand alone DTC01, a UNIBUS version and a PCI card version (DTC07). Do all these sound the same? Or are newer ones more advanced? The number (07) on the PCI version indicate that there has been at least seven versions, what are the others? And finally, does anyone have system over and would consider selling it? (DTC01 seems to be the simplest and is thus preferred) Regards, Pontus. From roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk Fri Mar 26 05:34:22 2010 From: roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk (Roger Holmes) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 10:34:22 +0000 Subject: Dice (was Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update)) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 26 Mar 2010, at 06:00, cctalk-request at classiccmp.org wrote: > > Message: 8 > Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:58:19 +0000 (GMT) > From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) > Subject: Re: OT: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news > update) > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Message-ID: > Content-Type: text/plain > >> There is a little test jig that is sometimes used, that holds diagonal >> corners of the die between centers, for a spin. If the die reverses >> direction of rotation right before it settles to a stop, then it fails. > > The 'Pviot test for loads'. There are several other ways to make dice > show numbers with the 'wrong' prboabiltiy, though. Six LCD displays, single chip microcomputer and an orientation sensor? :-) Keeps it on topic anyway. > > Totakky OT, byut 'Scarne on Dice' has a couple of chapters on this. (No, > I don't gamble, but I happen to have said book on my bookshelf) > > -tony > From lproven at gmail.com Fri Mar 26 07:33:05 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 12:33:05 +0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <5F2F91FA-9CD9-469E-8571-D7CA8D43A03C@mail.msu.edu> <575131af1003251758k2e5e5226t6ebc486b349f60a8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003260533w28c6862dtc4218b770e2003e8@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Mar 26, 2010 at 1:56 AM, Teo Zenios wrote: > Tandy FD1100FD. Green LCD (CGA), lead acid ?battery Should that be just 1100FD? Google has no hits for FD1100FD but I did find a few pics of an 1100FD. Never encountered that machine back in the day... -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From teoz at neo.rr.com Fri Mar 26 14:36:04 2010 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 15:36:04 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) References: <5F2F91FA-9CD9-469E-8571-D7CA8D43A03C@mail.msu.edu><575131af1003251758k2e5e5226t6ebc486b349f60a8@mail.gmail.com> <575131af1003260533w28c6862dtc4218b770e2003e8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <327F2FFCDE6544C08702ACA8016CE9B1@dell8300> Yes, 1100FD. I have a mint unit but the 720K floppy belt turned to goo and I have yet to get a replacement. It has DOS 3.3 in ROM and boots in seconds, nice CGA emulation on a readable screen. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Liam Proven" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Friday, March 26, 2010 8:33 AM Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) On Fri, Mar 26, 2010 at 1:56 AM, Teo Zenios wrote: > Tandy FD1100FD. Green LCD (CGA), lead acid battery Should that be just 1100FD? Google has no hits for FD1100FD but I did find a few pics of an 1100FD. Never encountered that machine back in the day... -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Fri Mar 26 13:46:18 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 18:46:18 -0000 Subject: Leaving computers on...and notebook batteries. References: <87C40FBB-6782-46DC-9035-9E603DA912B2@neurotica.com> <4BA41A55.3030309@jetnet.ab.ca><0E1B1C7D-1DF2-4B75-A725-62BB029DEE32@neurotica.com><4BA41D0B.7050309@jetnet.ab.ca> <017401cac858$1c624540$0f6a610a@user8459cef6fa> <4BA643BD.8060009@arachelian.com><00be01caca0d$adff3650$e6fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BA8DB90.6060006@arachelian.com><015201cacada$3f2f34a0$51fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BAA32C3.5050102@arachelian.com><001301cacc66$0e22c290$89fdf93e@user8459cef6fa> <4BABF9B5.6040906@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <00b301cacd1f$4cd15d30$4f07610a@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ray Arachelian" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Friday, March 26, 2010 12:03 AM Subject: Re: Leaving computers on...and notebook batteries. > > Andrew Burton wrote: > > > > I compared the two batteries. Physically they are almost identical. The > > connector slot (which can be seen in the picture here: > > http://www.digi163.com/battery/DELL-laptop-battery/Dell-Latitude-C610-battery.htm ) is slightly different on the newer one. It's the same design but the > > gaps between the connectors is visibly smaller, only by maybe a millimetre > > or so. The voltages are the same so I'll give it a try over the weekend. > > > Yup, give it a try. odds are it'll work just fine. Long as it fits, it > should work. > Ok :) > I have a similar replacement situation for my older macbook pro. Not > made by apple, but I've tried it and it works just fine despite the > higher mAh rating, just like yours. > > BTW, if you're not going to travel with the notebook much, you can still > use the old battery even if it only lasts 5 minutes. In this case, > it'll work as if it were a UPS. The reason I say this is that if you > keep a battery in a notebook and you don't discharge it once in a while > you'll find it will die pretty quickly. If you're going to travel > around with it, use the new battery. Make sure you charge up the new > battery before putting it away, and something like every 3-6 months you > should pop it back in and recharge it. If the charge goes completely to > zero (deep discharge) the battery is dead and will never be recoverable. Thanks, I now know what deep discharge is :) > > I don't know about dells, or that particular one, but I killed the > battery in my old macbook pro two years ago by leaving the machine on > 24x7 for about a month (I was inbetween jobs, previously to that, the > machine traveled with me). After that, it could barely hold half an > hour - usually less, and it would power off before fully discharging - > despite resetting the PMU and doing a few discharge/charge cycles. Odds > are dells are better than this, for sure Thinkpads do not have this > issue, but old Macbook pros with the swapable battery suffer from this. > > I've removed the battery from that machine completely now as I don't use > it anywhere nearly as much. But every 3-6 months I recharge it and > allow it to discharge, then recharge it again just to make sure I keep > it alive. > Ok. Thanks for the info and tips. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 26 14:56:25 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 19:56:25 +0000 (GMT) Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage In-Reply-To: <4BAB9E7F.8060302@telus.net> from "John Robertson" at Mar 25, 10 10:33:51 am Message-ID: > I'm with Chuck, this sounds like a clock issue to me too. If it's the original IBM5151 monitor, remember there's no horizontal oscillator in the monitor. The Hsync (or more correctly HDrv, which is what IBM called it) output from the MDA card goes to the base of the horiztoal driver transistor, the collector is then transformer-coupled to the base of the horizotnal output transistor. This means a 5151 will try to run at whatever freqeucny you give it, the horizotnal output stage is likley to protest if it's way off, though. I don;t think that if you give it an HDrv of the wrong frequency it will ever give you a double image. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 26 15:23:15 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 20:23:15 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <4BABDF46.8050907@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 25, 10 10:10:14 pm Message-ID: > My friend described one of those (a PPC640, not a PDP) as a "luggable". > As in "you could probably lug it from place to place, but it's not > exactly practical". Err, that also applies to a number of PDP11 models, and numerous other computers :-) IMHO the PPC with its fold-out full-size keyboard is impossible to use on a lap. It's also not practical to run from the internal C-cell battery pack (it takes 10 cells at a time and flattens primary cells in a couple of hours). I use mine almst solely with that Microtest dist drive aligment device I've mentioned in the past. I run it off the mains, from a home-made PSU (I never got the ofifical Amstrad one). -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 26 15:28:38 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 20:28:38 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <575131af1003251758k2e5e5226t6ebc486b349f60a8@mail.gmail.com> from "Liam Proven" at Mar 26, 10 00:58:49 am Message-ID: > Yes, that was my guess, too. Only laptop-/style/ portable I ever even The HP's I mentioned are very useable as laptops. > heard of with a lead-acid battery. *Gorgeous* monochrome active-matrix > LCD, too. Stunning for its time, still good today. > > But a bit too modern for Tony! I mean, it has a GUI and everything. > 1989 was just yesterday... > http://lowendmac.com/pb/macintosh-portable.html The Mac Portable, in common with all other Macs, is missing one essentail feature that the Amstrad PPC, HP110, HP Portable+ and my older laptops, Tandy M100, Epson HX20 and Epson PX8 all have (as do some other laptops I don't own). I am sure you can guess what that is ;-) -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 26 15:34:40 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 20:34:40 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100326082410.b38778e9.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> from "Jochen Kunz" at Mar 26, 10 08:24:10 am Message-ID: > The PSU of the HP9000 C240 / C360 are prone to this. A few friends and Which is the HP9000/240? Sounds like its ought to be a 9000/200 series machine, but it's nto one I've ever come across. > I had that problem. Several dead machines that would start only > sometimes when pluged in. Verry frustrating. Eventually a friend took a > weekend to reverse engineer the PSU and finaly found the faulty > resistor. We changed that resistor on all of our machines and they > work flawlessly since then. I was given an HP9144 tape drive beucase it was totally dead. After removing the conver and front paenl I found all PSU outputs were missing. So I slipped out the PSU board and had a quick look. The chopper was fine, nothing looked burnt and then I noticed a pair of (IIRC) 100k resistors in series. Aha, I thought, that looks like the startup resistor. One tested open circuit, so I replaced the pair for good measure. And it's been fine ever since. It took me under an hour to fix, never having seen one before... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Mar 26 15:42:57 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 20:42:57 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: <20100326084942.84bc4283.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> from "Jochen Kunz" at Mar 26, 10 08:49:42 am Message-ID: > > For an awful lot of applications you don't need more power than an old 8= > =20 > > bit processor IMHO. Think of the large number of small PICs, 8051s, etc=20 > > thatare are in use.=20 > Sure. That's the reason why 8 bit controllers are still in large > quantity production and new models come to the market. > > The point is: 30 years back there was no 32 bit 50 MHz controller > available, that cost only as much as a high end 8 bitter. So you where > limited when you actually needed that compute power.=20 Actually my moan is not with designers who use microcontrollers when they need computing power. I would regard it as insane not to use a 32 bit ARM microcontorller or similar if that's what was really needed. No, my moan is about designers who use a microcontrollor (often a PIC or AVR) when they don't really need it, when there are simpler, more reliable, and more repairable solutions. > > Eh? A simple microcprocessor + ROM + RAM + a couple of I/O chips will=20 > > work first time. It doesn't need to be debugged. > It needs to be debugged. At least when it is build by me. Belive me. ;-) Hmm... At least with a microprocessor+RAM+ROM+peripherals you can attempt to debug it. You can make meaningful emasurements and work out what's going wrong. With a single-chip microcotntroller there's an awful lot you can't check (whuch is what started this discussion). WIth some microcontrollers that I've used, mis-setting the clock configuration bits can cause 'intereting' results and there's no way to see that the darn thign isn't running > > > Seriously, there are places where they are the right thing to use. And=20 > > there are places where they are not. However, all to often so-called=20 > > designmrs want to solcve every problem with a mircocontroller... > Designers talk the language they are familar with. Today most disigners > are more familar with C then with BC548. ;-) While undoubtedly true, that worries me -- a lot. I can't rememebr who said 'Any 3rd-rate engineer can make a complicated device enve more complicated. It takes a genius to go back to first principles', but alas I feel there are far too manyy 3rd-rate engineers designing the things I have to use... -tony From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Mar 26 16:03:14 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 15:03:14 -0600 Subject: Disc analyser news update In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BAD2112.5020604@jetnet.ab.ca> Tony Duell wrote: > While undoubtedly true, that worries me -- a lot. I can't rememebr who > said 'Any 3rd-rate engineer can make a complicated device enve more > complicated. It takes a genius to go back to first principles', but alas > I feel there are far too manyy 3rd-rate engineers designing the things I > have to use... Well managent still is 'toss them a banana'1 for things that don't add to the profit margin. > -tony 1 At least for the code monkeys! From rdawson16 at hotmail.com Fri Mar 26 16:42:45 2010 From: rdawson16 at hotmail.com (Randy Dawson) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 16:42:45 -0500 Subject: slashdotted - home built turing machine Message-ID: Did you guys catch this: http://aturingmachine.com/ Cool! Randy _________________________________________________________________ The New Busy is not the old busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_3 From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Mar 26 17:48:27 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 16:48:27 -0600 Subject: slashdotted - home built turing machine In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BAD39BB.8060504@jetnet.ab.ca> Randy Dawson wrote: > > Did you guys catch this: > > http://aturingmachine.com/ > > Cool! Yes it is ! And a good use for a big MICRO processor chip to hold states. - Thinking of a 'Turning computer C compiler' I saw some where on the net.- :) Ben. From jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de Fri Mar 26 18:20:24 2010 From: jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de (Jochen Kunz) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 00:20:24 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <20100326082410.b38778e9.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> Message-ID: <20100327002024.20dd553d.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> On Fri, 26 Mar 2010 20:34:40 +0000 (GMT) ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote: > > The PSU of the HP9000 C240 / C360 are prone to this. A few friends and > Which is the HP9000/240? No, not the ancient M68k machine. HP9000 700-series C240 and C360. They where the second generation 64 bit PA-RISC workstatons. -- tsch??, Jochen Homepage: http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/ From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Fri Mar 26 20:41:16 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 01:41:16 +0000 Subject: HP 64000 relocatable file format / assembler In-Reply-To: <7d9403581003242123o47f91b2aua45936e5016e870d@mail.gmail.com> References: <4BAA7992.1030006@philpem.me.uk> <4BAA7D7E.8020904@philpem.me.uk> <4BAA8976.9020602@philpem.me.uk> <7d9403581003242123o47f91b2aua45936e5016e870d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BAD623C.1020105@philpem.me.uk> maurice smulders wrote: > I am picking apart the translation the file undergoes from DOS format to > HPLIF DOS format (with the LIF header) so I can generate a file directly > that way... lif_utils () will do that nicely. Or at the very least it'll let you extract the contents of a LIF file and display some information about it. Try 'lifstat', 'lifdir' and 'lifget'. I've been playing with the .R files and I've got a mostly-working OBJDUMP work-a-like sorted. It is one hell of a weird format, and the InvAsm virtual machine is no less weird. I'm starting to wonder if someone at HP Fort Collins was experimenting with illicit substances at the time InvAsm was conceived... Anyway, it's a pretty simple (if unusual) VM. One register (the accumulator) and a pretty simple instruction set. Add, subtract, AND, shift and rotate you can do, but forget multiply/divide (unless you feel like writing them yourself). The weird bits are (in no particular order) the segmented memory architecture (it's a Harvard Architecture, Jim, but not as we know it), fixed-size instructions (hey, kids, it's a 16-bit RISC-a-like), and the weird disparity between addressable memory zones in different instructions. Oh, and the Invasm assembler is bugged. Turns out you can make an output format specification with some truly weird parameters -- very few of them seem to be checked... :-o Ah well, it wouldn't be a HP product if it wasn't at least a little bit weird. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Sat Mar 27 07:19:12 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 13:19:12 +0100 Subject: pdp-11 ME11-L core memory system engineering drawings Message-ID: I've aquired the pdp-11 ME11-L core memory system engineering drawings. Before I put it on ebay, if some one is interested, contact me off-list. -Rik From lproven at gmail.com Sat Mar 27 07:53:00 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 12:53:00 +0000 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <575131af1003251758k2e5e5226t6ebc486b349f60a8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003270553q5d88ca65v7ad6c6cae24fb975@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Mar 26, 2010 at 8:28 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> Yes, that was my guess, too. Only laptop-/style/ portable I ever even > > The HP's I mentioned are very useable as laptops. > >> heard of with a lead-acid battery. *Gorgeous* monochrome active-matrix >> LCD, too. Stunning for its time, still good today. >> >> But a bit too modern for Tony! I mean, it has a GUI and everything. >> 1989 was just yesterday... >> http://lowendmac.com/pb/macintosh-portable.html > > The Mac Portable, in common with all other Macs, is missing one essentail > feature that the Amstrad PPC, HP110, HP Portable+ and my older laptops, > Tandy M100, Epson HX20 and Epson PX8 all have (as do some other laptops I > don't own). I am sure you can guess what that is ;-) [Sigh :?)] Yep, the disappearing feature that 99.99999% of users neither want nor need nor could use if they were given, that disbars you from using any 21st-century computer... -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From trixter at oldskool.org Sat Mar 27 08:58:55 2010 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 08:58:55 -0500 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <575131af1003270553q5d88ca65v7ad6c6cae24fb975@mail.gmail.com> References: <575131af1003251758k2e5e5226t6ebc486b349f60a8@mail.gmail.com> <575131af1003270553q5d88ca65v7ad6c6cae24fb975@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BAE0F1F.9030309@oldskool.org> On Fri, Mar 26, 2010 at 8:28 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> The Mac Portable, in common with all other Macs, is missing one essentail >> feature that the Amstrad PPC, HP110, HP Portable+ and my older laptops, >> Tandy M100, Epson HX20 and Epson PX8 all have (as do some other laptops I >> don't own). I am sure you can guess what that is ;-) The use of off-the-shelf AA or AAA batteries? -- 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 classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Sat Mar 27 11:36:21 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 16:36:21 +0000 Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: <4B96B2DE.1050809@philpem.me.uk> References: <4B96B2DE.1050809@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4BAE3405.2090809@philpem.me.uk> Another quick update... The hardware is on hold for now. I've been unceremoniously kicked out of the shed and utility so my Dad can grow some more plants... "The greenhouse is full. This is more important than your electronic gadgets and trinkets." *sigh*. I'll see about getting a website set up with some screenshots and a couple of mailing lists (likely an ANNOUNCE list, and a combined USERS/DEVELOPERS list) for discussions. Ugh. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Sat Mar 27 11:44:58 2010 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 17:44:58 +0100 Subject: pdp-11 ME11-L core memory system engineering drawings In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <111F26A840334F1C83EF4C344E35E5B8@xp1800> It's spoken for.. -Rik > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Rik Bos > Verzonden: zaterdag 27 maart 2010 13:19 > Aan: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts' > Onderwerp: pdp-11 ME11-L core memory system engineering drawings > > I've aquired the pdp-11 ME11-L core memory system > engineering drawings. > Before I put it on ebay, if some one is interested, contact > me off-list. > > -Rik > > From michaelkraus1969 at yahoo.com Fri Mar 26 15:58:07 2010 From: michaelkraus1969 at yahoo.com (Mike Kraus) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 13:58:07 -0700 (PDT) Subject: PDP, TYPESET-8 and linotypes Message-ID: <439587.63231.qm@web110614.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Linotypes, when driven from paper tape, used the 64 bit, six level TTS or Teletypesetter code. There are two key line ending codes that were always in sequence. One was the?RETURN code and the other was the ELEVATE code. ? On the linotype, the ELEVATE key would end the line and "elevate" the matrixes, as a group, to the caster and eventually to the distributor. ? ? From pinball at telus.net Fri Mar 26 16:43:39 2010 From: pinball at telus.net (John Robertson) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 14:43:39 -0700 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage In-Reply-To: <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com> References: <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com> Message-ID: <4BAD2A8B.6080003@telus.net> B Degnan wrote: > > This is certainly not a capacitor problem... > > > > I think this board uses 2144s as the video memory > > So my first guess is to replace the RAMs. > > > > -tony > > > > ---- > > > > I'd be looking for a stuck address bit, or possibly a failed RAM chip > > My money's on a 74xx chip (possibly a counter, buffer or multiplexer) > > that's had an output fail open. > > > > Phil > > > > ----- > > Along with Phil's suggestion of memory addressing issues resulting in a > > double-scan of the memory, the staggering of the images suggests > interlacing > > might be occurring when it shouldn't be. Sometimes it is possible to > tweak the > > V/H-hold controls enough on monitors to end up with interlacing > occurring when > > it shouldn't. Can you discern whether each of the scan images > contains a full > > set of lines vs half the number of lines? > > > > I hate to ask, but what sort of monitor is this being displayed on? > > IIRC the scan rate for MDA was higher than NTSC and I'm not not sure > whether an > > NTSC monitor would sync up or sync down to half the scan rate. > > > > Brent > > ----------------- > > Thanks for the feedback. I am using a standard IBM monochrome > monitor. I tested the monitor with another known-working card, and I > also tried another monitor. The problem is with the display card. > > This is one of the original black connector versions of the IBM > 1904057 XM 407 display cards. It has 9114 RAMs in it, not socketed of > course, so I think if I can probe each RAM chip first to ID the bad > chip it'd be more efficient. I would similarly have to check the > 74L chips. oy! > > > Bill Degnan > > An old trick for testing DRAM in circuit is to simply press over the suspect RAM a known-to-be-good RAM with the pins tightly touching. In many cases DRAM failures relate to failing pull-downs and thus a good DRAM in parallel will take the load and provide good results. This doesn't work for Static RAM though as far as I know. And I don't know if 9114s are Static or Dynamic, I suspect they are Static, but if DRAM then the test above may help avoid desoldering a pack of them... John :-#)# -- John's Jukes Ltd. 2343 Main St., Vancouver, BC, Canada V5T 3C9 Call (604)872-5757 or Fax 872-2010 (Pinballs, Jukes, VideoGames) www.flippers.com "Old pinballers never die, they just flip out" From mdelepeleire at hotmail.com Fri Mar 26 17:59:09 2010 From: mdelepeleire at hotmail.com (Marc Delepeleire) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 22:59:09 +0000 Subject: Data I/O29A Message-ID: Hello, I cannot find doc informing how to send ie an .HEX file from Hyper terminal to my programmer, when the programmer sends a file to the cpu the format is a sort of a start character, the address of the first byte and then a series of : HH HH HH HH HH etc where H stands for a hex symbol. Do I need to translate the Intel Hex file or how can I send an OMF-51 file? Do I have to use another communication program?? Thanks if you can help me. Marc De Lepeleire _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Trusted email with Microsoft?s powerful SPAM protection. https://signup.live.com/signup.aspx?id=60969 From bruce at Wild-Hare.com Sat Mar 27 12:48:48 2010 From: bruce at Wild-Hare.com (Bruce Ray) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 11:48:48 -0600 Subject: Whatever happened to the DG software archive... References: <8dd2d95c1003220517m19db0618led3bc7e053a4c445@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <084701cacdd5$c223e1a0$6601a8c0@linksys> G'day Mike - International client crunch project hit several weeks ago, but I'm back in the US now and still working with the DG archiving project. The "deal" was not cancelled, but you are correct... these elective projects always take longer that wished, especially when the darn "day job" interferes. Bruce Bruce Ray Wild Hare Computer Systems, Inc. bkr at WildHareComputers.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Michael Kerpan" To: Sent: Monday, March 22, 2010 06:17 AM Subject: Whatever happened to the DG software archive... > ... that was announced by Bruce Ray back in December. The original > posting promised details in a few weeks but AFAIK such details never > can forward. Did something happen to cancel the deal at the last > second or are things just taking longer than originally thought. > > Mike > From cclist at sydex.com Sat Mar 27 15:09:52 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 13:09:52 -0700 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage In-Reply-To: <4BAD2A8B.6080003@telus.net> References: , <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com>, <4BAD2A8B.6080003@telus.net> Message-ID: <4BAE03A0.26847.D302DC@cclist.sydex.com> On 26 Mar 2010 at 14:43, John Robertson wrote: > An old trick for testing DRAM in circuit is to simply press over the > suspect RAM a known-to-be-good RAM with the pins tightly touching. In > many cases DRAM failures relate to failing pull-downs and thus a good > DRAM in parallel will take the load and provide good results. Again, I apologize for stating the obvious. But it would seem to me that if there were a problem with the SRAM on the MDA, one could easily deduce this with a simple memory test, as the MDA DRAM is memory-mapped in the PC's address space. If it tests good, then in all likelihood, the fault is somewhere else. --Chuck From billdeg at degnanco.com Sat Mar 27 15:10:10 2010 From: billdeg at degnanco.com (B Degnan) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 16:10:10 -0400 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BAE6622.80806@degnanco.com> > > If it's the original IBM5151 monitor, remember there's no horizontal > oscillator in the monitor. The Hsync (or more correctly HDrv, which is > what IBM called it) output from the MDA card goes to the base of the > horiztoal driver transistor, the collector is then transformer-coupled to > the base of the horizotnal output transistor. > > This means a 5151 will try to run at whatever freqeucny you give it, the > horizotnal output stage is likley to protest if it's way off, though. I > don;t think that if you give it an HDrv of the wrong frequency it will > ever give you a double image. > > -tony > It is a 5151. I was able to reproduce the problem on a newer monochrome monitor. bd From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 27 14:40:52 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 19:40:52 +0000 (GMT) Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage In-Reply-To: <4BAD2A8B.6080003@telus.net> from "John Robertson" at Mar 26, 10 02:43:39 pm Message-ID: > And I don't know if 9114s are Static or Dynamic, I suspect they are Sorry, there was a typo in one of my replies (as ever). I meant '2114' RAMs (not 2144). The 9114 is much the same chip. It's 1K*4 static RAM, in my experience a very unreliable chip... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 27 15:31:36 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 20:31:36 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: <4BAE3405.2090809@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 27, 10 04:36:21 pm Message-ID: > > Another quick update... > > The hardware is on hold for now. I've been unceremoniously kicked out of > the shed and utility so my Dad can grow some more plants... "The > greenhouse is full. This is more important than your electronic gadgets > and trinkets." Herbicides workl wonders, you know... Mroe seriously, I am wodnerign why the shed is the only place where you can use a soldering iron. Don;t you have a kitchen table? -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 27 15:18:54 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 20:18:54 +0000 (GMT) Subject: slashdotted - home built turing machine In-Reply-To: <4BAD39BB.8060504@jetnet.ab.ca> from "Ben" at Mar 26, 10 04:48:27 pm Message-ID: > > Randy Dawson wrote: > > > > Did you guys catch this: > > > > http://aturingmachine.com/ > > > > Cool! > > Yes it is ! > And a good use for a big MICRO processor chip to hold states. Using a microprocessor for soemthing like this seems almost like cheating to me. I think we all know a mucroprocessor can simulate a truing machine (modulo the finite amount of memory). If I was doing it, I'd use a RAM to hold a lookup table (say 64K, with the 16 address lines being the 8 bits of the current state and the 8 bits of the character from the 'tape'), Output from the RAM is the next state number (8 bits), character to write (8 bits), whether to wite the character to the 'tape', incremebnt/decrement 'tape postion'. Then an 8 bit latch to store the current state, a large RAM and address counter to simulate the 'tape' and a small amount of control logic. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 27 15:21:31 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 20:21:31 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <20100327002024.20dd553d.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> from "Jochen Kunz" at Mar 27, 10 00:20:24 am Message-ID: > > > The PSU of the HP9000 C240 / C360 are prone to this. A few friends and > > Which is the HP9000/240? > No, not the ancient M68k machine. HP9000 700-series C240 and C360. THis is classiccmp. The HP9000/200 series are not ancient (not by comparison with many of the machines were talk about here). > They where the second generation 64 bit PA-RISC workstatons. Oh, right... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 27 15:22:47 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 20:22:47 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP 64000 relocatable file format / assembler In-Reply-To: <4BAD623C.1020105@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 27, 10 01:41:16 am Message-ID: > lif_utils () will do > that nicely. Or at the very least it'll let you extract the contents of > a LIF file and display some information about it. Try 'lifstat', > 'lifdir' and 'lifget'. And you even get a design for a microcontroller-based project (nothing at all to do with LIF disks...) -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Mar 27 15:40:45 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 20:40:45 +0000 (GMT) Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double In-Reply-To: <4BAE6622.80806@degnanco.com> from "B Degnan" at Mar 27, 10 04:10:10 pm Message-ID: > It is a 5151. I was able to reproduce the problem on a newer monochrome > monitor. Wil lthe machine boot properly (apart from the double image)? Can you run BASIC? If so, what happens if you try PRINTing things to this display? -tony From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Mar 27 16:16:14 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 17:16:14 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <45AECD70-FECD-42FD-A301-2B6F30C01B36@neurotica.com> On Mar 27, 2010, at 4:31 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> Another quick update... >> >> The hardware is on hold for now. I've been unceremoniously kicked >> out of >> the shed and utility so my Dad can grow some more plants... "The >> greenhouse is full. This is more important than your electronic >> gadgets >> and trinkets." > > Herbicides workl wonders, you know... > > Mroe seriously, I am wodnerign why the shed is the only place where > you > can use a soldering iron. Don;t you have a kitchen table? I was thinking more like "TIME TO MOVE". -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From robert at irrelevant.com Sat Mar 27 16:40:36 2010 From: robert at irrelevant.com (Rob) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 21:40:36 +0000 Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: <45AECD70-FECD-42FD-A301-2B6F30C01B36@neurotica.com> References: <45AECD70-FECD-42FD-A301-2B6F30C01B36@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <2f806cd71003271440u4bc30243m37aa89a69d3a0c7c@mail.gmail.com> Or just add another shed .... From geneb at deltasoft.com Sat Mar 27 16:45:05 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 14:45:05 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, 27 Mar 2010, Tony Duell wrote: >> >> Another quick update... >> >> The hardware is on hold for now. I've been unceremoniously kicked out of >> the shed and utility so my Dad can grow some more plants... "The >> greenhouse is full. This is more important than your electronic gadgets >> and trinkets." > > Herbicides workl wonders, you know... > > Mroe seriously, I am wodnerign why the shed is the only place where you > can use a soldering iron. Don;t you have a kitchen table? I suspect that the Luddite in Charge may have something to say about that too. g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From cclist at sydex.com Sat Mar 27 16:49:48 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 14:49:48 -0700 Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: <2f806cd71003271440u4bc30243m37aa89a69d3a0c7c@mail.gmail.com> References: , <45AECD70-FECD-42FD-A301-2B6F30C01B36@neurotica.com>, <2f806cd71003271440u4bc30243m37aa89a69d3a0c7c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BAE1B0C.1811.12E810A@cclist.sydex.com> On 27 Mar 2010 at 21:40, Rob wrote: > Or just add another shed .... Yes, but then he would be Philip "Two Sheds" Pemberton... --Chuck From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sat Mar 27 19:44:42 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 18:44:42 -0600 Subject: slashdotted - home built turing machine In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BAEA67A.3020403@jetnet.ab.ca> Tony Duell wrote: > If I was doing it, I'd use a RAM to hold a lookup table (say 64K, with > the 16 address lines being the 8 bits of the current state and the 8 bits > of the character from the 'tape'), Output from the RAM is the next state > number (8 bits), character to write (8 bits), whether to wite the > character to the 'tape', incremebnt/decrement 'tape postion'. Then an 8 > bit latch to store the current state, a large RAM and address counter to > simulate the 'tape' and a small amount of control logic. I think BYTE had a version like that, when they where not a PC review magizine. Still that type of machine is better 'visible' machine than something you would use day to day. Any kind of memory was the problem back then, not computing logic. > -tony > Ben. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sat Mar 27 20:11:52 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 19:11:52 -0600 Subject: slashdotted - home built turing machine - II In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BAEACD8.3060006@jetnet.ab.ca> Tony Duell wrote: > If I was doing it, I'd use a RAM to hold a lookup table (say 64K, with > the 16 address lines being the 8 bits of the current state and the 8 bits > of the character from the 'tape'), Output from the RAM is the next state > number (8 bits), character to write (8 bits), whether to wite the > character to the 'tape', incremebnt/decrement 'tape postion'. Then an 8 > bit latch to store the current state, a large RAM and address counter to > simulate the 'tape' and a small amount of control logic. > > -tony > This is more fun for a demo machine -- Universial Turing Machine. http://www.rdrop.com/~half/General/UTM/index.html It seems both the program and states are recorded on the tape. The Turning State table is fixed for just *ONE* instruction set - Everything ! (note still single tasking). Ben. From mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com Sat Mar 27 21:28:51 2010 From: mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com (Michael B. Brutman) Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 21:28:51 -0500 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage In-Reply-To: <4BAD2A8B.6080003@telus.net> References: <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com> <4BAD2A8B.6080003@telus.net> Message-ID: <4BAEBEE3.2050901@brutman.com> John Robertson wrote: > An old trick for testing DRAM in circuit is to simply press over the > suspect RAM a known-to-be-good RAM with the pins tightly touching. In > many cases DRAM failures relate to failing pull-downs and thus a good > DRAM in parallel will take the load and provide good results. > > This doesn't work for Static RAM though as far as I know. > > And I don't know if 9114s are Static or Dynamic, I suspect they are > Static, but if DRAM then the test above may help avoid desoldering a > pack of them... > > John :-#)# > I've never heard that trick. I have a PCjr in the neighborhood that is failing to post with a memory error on the 64KB that is soldered to the motherboard. Is it really just as simple as piggy-backing the chip? I realize that what you described works only for one class of problems, but it seems like such an easy thing to try. Are there similar tricks I should know about? Mike From gyorpb at gmail.com Sat Mar 27 23:26:31 2010 From: gyorpb at gmail.com (Joost van de Griek) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 06:26:31 +0200 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <575131af1003251758k2e5e5226t6ebc486b349f60a8@mail.gmail.com> References: <5F2F91FA-9CD9-469E-8571-D7CA8D43A03C@mail.msu.edu> <575131af1003251758k2e5e5226t6ebc486b349f60a8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <766444381003272126w5358c517v9c7aa3a253329f80@mail.gmail.com> On 26 March 2010 02:58, Liam Proven wrote: > On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 7:42 PM, Josh Dersch wrote: > >> I was thinking more of the battery in the original Mac Portable (which I >> know is not what you're referring to). ?The portable weighed 16lbs, due in >> no small part to the lead-acid battery it used. > > Yes, that was my guess, too. Only laptop-/style/ portable I ever even > heard of with a lead-acid battery. PowerBook 100. Basically a repackaged Portable. > *Gorgeous* monochrome active-matrix > LCD, too. Stunning for its time, still good today. Mighty fine keyboard and trackball. All of which are sacrificed in the PB100. .tsooJ From hachti at hachti.de Sat Mar 27 23:38:22 2010 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 06:38:22 +0200 Subject: Servo tracks on SMD disk Message-ID: <4BAEDD3E.6060506@hachti.de> Hi, I have some trouble with a 14" removable SMD disk drive (Ampex DFR 996): When it comes to the outer tracks it starts making noises like a cat and recalibrates. Endlessly. With some disks I have it manages to crouch up to the end, track by track with many retries. The problem seems to exist with most of the packs I have. I played around with the head cables while the heads are further outside. Seems to be no contact/strain problem here. The drive seems to be working fine for the rest of the surface. But having the end unusable makes the disks unusable for RT11 with its replacement tables. And if the drive doesn't even manage to arrive at the end, RT11 won't even write a new directory to the disk. The drive does not recalibrate on bad blocks. So the problem should be in the servo system and nowhere else. Does my problem sound familiar in any way? Playing with the servo head amplifier gain adjustment did not help. In fact I found out that there's a working range, and the original adjustment was quite in the middle of that. So I kept it the way it was adjusted. For real readjustment of the drive I'd need a disk exerciser board, CE cartridge and some other special purpose bits. None of them are available to me. Another idea is that the servo data is decaying more quickly in the center of the disk: The disk hub is held by a magnet in on the spindle. The magnetic field and the mechanical shock while inserting the cartridge could affect the disk. Or/and the problem could be caused by thinner magnetic coating in the center (too close to the inner edge of the coating?). Vague theses.... The disk drive also has a fixed disk with three disks and 5 data plus 1 servo surface. That works flawlessly. Any comments? If somebody can provide one or more known good and recently tested cartridges, I'd be glad to give them a try. Packs are named CDC 1204. Best wishes, Philipp From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Mar 28 08:42:48 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 09:42:48 -0400 Subject: Data I/O29A In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mar 26, 2010, at 6:59 PM, Marc Delepeleire wrote: > I cannot find doc informing how to send ie an .HEX file from Hyper > terminal to my programmer, when the programmer sends a file to the > cpu the format is a sort of a start character, the address of the > first byte and then a series of : > > HH HH HH HH HH etc where H stands for a hex symbol. > > Do I need to translate the Intel Hex file or how can I send an > OMF-51 file? > > Do I have to use another communication program?? > > Thanks if you can help me. It's an annoying Yahoo group, but there's a mailing list for Data I/O equipment users here: http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/Data_IO_EPROM/ If you've not yet solved this problem, I suggest joining and asking there. There are a lot of very helpful people there. > -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From lproven at gmail.com Sun Mar 28 12:00:33 2010 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 18:00:33 +0100 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <766444381003272126w5358c517v9c7aa3a253329f80@mail.gmail.com> References: <5F2F91FA-9CD9-469E-8571-D7CA8D43A03C@mail.msu.edu> <575131af1003251758k2e5e5226t6ebc486b349f60a8@mail.gmail.com> <766444381003272126w5358c517v9c7aa3a253329f80@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <575131af1003281000x78657fa3mb5416437e32f6d26@mail.gmail.com> On Sun, Mar 28, 2010 at 5:26 AM, Joost van de Griek wrote: > On 26 March 2010 02:58, Liam Proven wrote: > >> On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 7:42 PM, Josh Dersch wrote: >> >>> I was thinking more of the battery in the original Mac Portable (which I >>> know is not what you're referring to). ?The portable weighed 16lbs, due in >>> no small part to the lead-acid battery it used. >> >> Yes, that was my guess, too. Only laptop-/style/ portable I ever even >> heard of with a lead-acid battery. > > PowerBook 100. Basically a repackaged Portable. [Checks on LowEndMac.com] Huh. I did not know that. I didn't think there was any way to squeeze an LA battery into the PB100, and they were not that heavy for the time. Live and learn. -- 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/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508 From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Sun Mar 28 12:39:22 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 10:39:22 -0700 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage References: <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com> Message-ID: <4BAF944A.7F626CFE@cs.ubc.ca> B Degnan wrote: > > This is one of the original black connector versions of the IBM 1904057 > XM 407 display cards. It has 9114 RAMs in it, not socketed of course, > so I think if I can probe each RAM chip first to ID the bad chip it'd be > more efficient. I would similarly have to check the 74L chips. oy! Tony Duell wrote: > > Sorry, there was a typo in one of my replies (as ever). I meant '2114' > RAMs (not 2144). The 9114 is much the same chip. > > It's 1K*4 static RAM, in my experience a very unreliable chip... Just a few weeks ago I had to replace two 9114 SRAMs to fix a video display problem in a Xerox-820/FBB-based machine. The problem there was the wrong characters being displayed, so it was a 'data-related' problem rather than address. I was trying to figure out the failure mode of the 9114's I removed, but haven't discerned much yet. Nonetheless, I wonder if there was a common failure mode on these chips, something like inadequate protection on inputs due to chip geometry or such, so that a design fault might manifest itself in different ways. Does anyone know if IC manufacturers shared the masks when they cross-licensed common ICs such as these, so that the same fault may show up in units from different manufacturers? From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Sun Mar 28 13:10:13 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:10:13 -0700 Subject: IBM Monochrome "Black and White" Parallel card double iimage References: <4BAB5A46.20306@degnanco.com> <4BAF944A.7F626CFE@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <4BAF9B86.226C4856@cs.ubc.ca> Brent Hilpert wrote: > > B Degnan wrote: > > > > This is one of the original black connector versions of the IBM 1904057 > > XM 407 display cards. It has 9114 RAMs in it, not socketed of course, > > so I think if I can probe each RAM chip first to ID the bad chip it'd be > > more efficient. I would similarly have to check the 74L chips. oy! > > Tony Duell wrote: > > > > Sorry, there was a typo in one of my replies (as ever). I meant '2114' > > RAMs (not 2144). The 9114 is much the same chip. > > > > It's 1K*4 static RAM, in my experience a very unreliable chip... > > Just a few weeks ago I had to replace two 9114 SRAMs to fix a video display > problem in a Xerox-820/FBB-based machine. The problem there was the wrong > characters being displayed, so it was a 'data-related' problem rather than address. > > I was trying to figure out the failure mode of the 9114's I removed, but > haven't discerned much yet. Nonetheless, I wonder if there was a common failure > mode on these chips, something like inadequate protection on inputs due to chip > geometry or such, so that a design fault might manifest itself in different ways. > > Does anyone know if IC manufacturers shared the masks when they cross-licensed > common ICs such as these, so that the same fault may show up in units from > different manufacturers? I should add that I replaced the 9114's with 2114's. If it isn't clear from Tony's messages, they are pin/function compatible (if not identical), and 2114's are much more common. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 28 13:09:33 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 19:09:33 +0100 (BST) Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: <4BAE1B0C.1811.12E810A@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Mar 27, 10 02:49:48 pm Message-ID: > > On 27 Mar 2010 at 21:40, Rob wrote: > > > Or just add another shed .... > > Yes, but then he would be Philip "Two Sheds" Pemberton... You beat me to it :-) -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Mar 28 13:23:50 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 19:23:50 +0100 (BST) Subject: Servo tracks on SMD disk In-Reply-To: <4BAEDD3E.6060506@hachti.de> from "Philipp Hachtmann" at Mar 28, 10 06:38:22 am Message-ID: > > Hi, > > I have some trouble with a 14" removable SMD disk drive (Ampex DFR 996): > When it comes to the outer tracks it starts making noises like a cat and Based on my experiences with Pentina, I don't believe a cat makes a unique sound... Anyway, I assume you know it's not headcrashing (which can make a noise like a very angry cat). I think you'd know if that was the case... > recalibrates. Endlessly. With some disks I have it manages to crouch up > to the end, track by track with many retries. The problem seems to exist > with most of the packs I have. I played around with the head cables > while the heads are further outside. Seems to be no contact/strain > problem here. The drive seems to be working fine for the rest of the > surface. But having the end unusable makes the disks unusable for RT11 > with its replacement tables. And if the drive doesn't even manage to > arrive at the end, RT11 won't even write a new directory to the disk. > The drive does not recalibrate on bad blocks. So the problem should be > in the servo system and nowhere else. > > Does my problem sound familiar in any way? > > Playing with the servo head amplifier gain adjustment did not help. In > fact I found out that there's a working range, and the original > adjustment was quite in the middle of that. So I kept it the way it was > adjusted. For real readjustment of the drive I'd need a disk exerciser > board, CE cartridge and some other special purpose bits. None of them > are available to me. > > Another idea is that the servo data is decaying more quickly in the > center of the disk: The disk hub is held by a magnet in on the spindle. > The magnetic field and the mechanical shock while inserting the > cartridge could affect the disk. Or/and the problem could be caused by > thinner magnetic coating in the center (too close to the inner edge of > the coating?). Vague theses.... > > The disk drive also has a fixed disk with three disks and 5 data plus 1 > servo surface. That works flawlessly. This sounds somewhat similar in concept to the CDC 'Phoenix' drive. There's a separate servo surface for the remvoable pack (one servo, one data), and the 3 fixed disks (1 servo, 5 data surfaces). What do you mean by 'outer' tracks? Normally, I would take that to mean ones closest to the edge of the disk, but it appears you mean ones neares the spindle. Do you have schematics and a 'scope? The first point I would look at is th edrive to the positioner amplifier, just to make sure there's a component of the right frequency there to procude the noise. Since it works correctly on the fixed disk servo surface, Iwould guess a lot of the electronics must be working correctly. So the problem might well be in the removable paclk's servo head, or the preamplifer stage after it. Are there any other electronci changes made when going from the fixed ot the removable pack (change in gain?). What about any velocity feedback signal? That would have been an early guess of mine (lost of this can make the servo unstable), but why would it only affect the removeable pack? Can you look at the output of the servo head preamplifer when using the fixed disk (which works correctly) and the remveable disk? Step one cylinder at a time going towards the 'bad' part and see if you can notice any changes in the signal. I do have a CDC Phoenix service manual, if you think the drives are related I can take a look... -tony From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Sun Mar 28 15:54:03 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 21:54:03 +0100 Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BAFC1EB.4010007@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: > Mroe seriously, I am wodnerign why the shed is the only place where you > can use a soldering iron. Don;t you have a kitchen table? I do. There are a few problems with its use: 1) It's currently covered in fruit, veg and other similar food products. 2) Said table is in close proximity to a cage which is home to a breeding pair of chinchillas (and two 3-month-old kits). Mum doesn't want them exposed to solder fumes and random volatile chemicals. 3) There's an active ban on the use of soldering irons in the kitchen after I burned a hole in the lino a few years ago. In my defence, it would have been a smaller hole if the blasted fire extinguisher had actually worked! Little hint: second-hand safety equipment is a false economy. Dad bought an "unused, but believed working" fire extinguisher from a "friend" at work -- I tried to use it and it sputtered a bit, then died. Dave McGuire> I was thinking more like "TIME TO MOVE". Top of my "To Do" list. Problem is it involves two things I don't really have at the moment: time and money. Based on a quick Google search, even a 1-bed "student" flat in a not particularly nice area of town (I've been told the police call it a "no-go" for walking patrols, which sounds about right) is going to cost me ~?200 a month unfurnished, plus electric bills and such. Not gonna happen on my wages.... :-/ Rob> Or just add another shed .... But that would involve removing either the greenhouse or the bird feeder. And no doubt the Luddite In Charge would just install shelves and grow more plants in there anyway... The garage might be an option, if I can get the car out of there (once again requiring the approval of the Luddite In Charge) and find a table and a space-heater. I sure as hell wouldn't try and lug the 16500B and a PC out there though, so debugging options might be, shall we say "limited". I've got him browsing the Internet on a Linux laptop so he's not a total Luddite, although the concept of a PVR is lost on him... "It's like a video recorder but it's better quality, has a programme guide and you can do Series Link so you don't have to keep reprogramming it every week" "So what was wrong with the video recorder?" Although curiously, despite having done a basic computer course that mandated the use of Windows, he picked up the basics of using Linux quicker than my younger brother. Said brother is still point-blank refusing to even try Linux because "if they have to give it away for free then it must be crap". And yet he uses Firefox, Thunderbird, OpenOffice, and a ton of other OSS/FS stuff. Hypocrisy in action. Some days it's not worth chewing through the leather straps in the morning. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Mar 28 16:46:55 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 17:46:55 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: <4BAFC1EB.4010007@philpem.me.uk> References: <4BAFC1EB.4010007@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: On Mar 28, 2010, at 4:54 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote: > Said brother is still point-blank refusing to even try Linux > because "if they have to give it away for free then it must be crap". I'll happily sell him a copy of Linux for USD $1MIL. Then it'll be REALLY good, right? What a moron. No offense (to you) intended. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Sun Mar 28 17:09:01 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 23:09:01 +0100 Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: References: <4BAFC1EB.4010007@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4BAFD37D.6080008@philpem.me.uk> Dave McGuire wrote: > I'll happily sell him a copy of Linux for USD $1MIL. Then it'll be > REALLY good, right? Well, I can't see that being a problem, as long as you include the source code 8^P He's in the doghouse anyway... apparently the software for his Zune deletes the file from the disc when you remove something from the "music collection". Doesn't even ask if you want to delete them, and doesn't go through the Recycle Bin either. Such an amazing decision could only come from The Beast of Redmond. The clincher is that he mounted the MUSIC share on the fileserver as a drive on his PC... then set that as his Zune Collection folder. You can guess what happened. "Oh, I don't like Status Quo, Queen or Goo Goo Dolls.. *delete*. Tina Dico? *delete*"... I now have 14 albums that need re-ripping or buying again as MP3s from Amazon (some of them were originally bought from iTunes when it was the "only game in town".. and then promptly had the DRM stripped with MyFairTunes). You can insult me all you like, but deleting stuff from //FILESHARE/MUSIC... that's taking a serious disregard for one's safety. Especially when I warned him not to point the Zune software at the music share..... At this point he'll be lucky if he gets his LAN connection back. Or I might connect him back up through a 10Mbit hub with a machine constantly blasting out garbage packets - that could be fun :-) > What a moron. No offense (to you) intended. See above. 8^) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From hachti at hachti.de Sun Mar 28 21:21:17 2010 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 04:21:17 +0200 Subject: Probably offering TC11 controller Message-ID: <4BB00E9D.3040003@hachti.de> Hi folks, I'll most probably offer a TC11 controller for sale in the next days. The controller connects to a pdp11's Unibus and can handle up to eight TU55/TU56 tape transports (i.e. four TU56). It is configured for TU56 control levels ("integrated circuit"). Ebay would probably be the easiest way to handle a transaction with overseas buyers. Are there interested persons willing to pay nearly USD 150 for shipping? Regards, Philipp From hachti at hachti.de Sun Mar 28 21:46:41 2010 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 04:46:41 +0200 Subject: Servo tracks on SMD disk In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BB01491.8070307@hachti.de> Hi Tony, > Based on my experiences with Pentina, I don't believe a cat makes a > unique sound... You're speaking of the individuality of a DOG! A cat makes miau! :-) > > Anyway, I assume you know it's not headcrashing (which can make a noise > like a very angry cat). I think you'd know if that was the case... No crash. But I have to admit that I got the drive crashed a few years ago. After cleaning and using another pack it worked. I had 3 packs for it. At some point in history I got a bunch of packs. They were used with a somewhat dubious Nova clone system (DDC or DCC). They never really worked fine. A few months ago now the drive completely broke down: After having successfully used the machine for several hours and pausing for another few weeks, I ran into disaster: A mechanical buffer at the back of the head slide had changed to a sticky liquid and blocked the whole mechanism. That resulted in the heads staying on disk while the drive did an urgency spindown. I disassembled the whole thing and cleaned away the mess as good as possible. I did not touch the head alignment. The heads stayed bolted to their slide and were taken aside as a whole block. I also took care for the heads not getting in contact. This week I reassembled the drive and tried it out. The cartridge that was in the drive during the disaster was far gone and runs with "pre-crash" noise. I realized that I had only the dubious packs. Some of them as I found out yesterday can be formatted by the Emulex SC02 controller's low level format routine, some stop shortly before the end (as I explained before). When I then try to use them, I can run "INIT/BADBLOCKS" under RT11 which says no bad blocks. Then when copying data in, I get write errors and bad blocks. Number increases. They stay and are in the system area most of the time. So I cannot use the packs :-( The whole procedure can be repeated using the low-level formatting routine and then RT11 INIT. That leads to the idea that there's something wrong about the data as well. > This sounds somewhat similar in concept to the CDC 'Phoenix' drive. > There's a separate servo surface for the remvoable pack (one servo, one > data), and the 3 fixed disks (1 servo, 5 data surfaces). Exactly. > > What do you mean by 'outer' tracks? Normally, I would take that to mean > ones closest to the edge of the disk, but it appears you mean ones neares > the spindle. Sorry, meant "inner", of course! I was tiredly writing in foreign English... > Do you have schematics and a 'scope? Yes. But... Sorry for saying that: That machine has a very very low priority in my project queue as it's something from the 80s. I currently have enough older stuff to repair (RK05s, TU56s, PDP8/I, PDP8/Ls, Honeywell DDP-516 and H316 reconfiguration and testing, etc.). I just wanted to get it either working and back in the rack or out of the window (i.e. give it to someone else, NOT trashing it!). > What about any velocity > feedback signal? Speed might be worth a thought: - If running too slow, servo and data head read levels might be low. I doubt that it's that but this could serve as an explanation for servo AND data problems. - If running too fast, bad things at the end of sectors can happen. And the write current could be insufficient for a good write. Servo should be not affected by this. I esteem that both possibilities need a great variation in speed. So I assume that speed is not the problem. But I'll try to check that next time I get to the drive! > That would have been an early guess of mine (lost of > this can make the servo unstable), but why would it only affect the > removeable pack? I'm not 100% sure but I think to remember that the fixed and the removable disk use separate motors. At least I remember a power plug labelled "motor 2"! > Can you look at the output of the servo head preamplifer when using the > fixed disk (which works correctly) and the remveable disk? I'll try to. > Step one > cylinder at a time going towards the 'bad' part and see if you can notice > any changes in the signal. I have nothing to single step the drive. No exerciser and no pdp11 programming experience (yet, will come when I get to resurrect the 11/20). And there's that Emulex controller between the pdp and the drive. That remaps the disk afaik. > I do have a CDC Phoenix service manual, if you think the drives are > related I can take a look... I have the complete manual with schematics sitting here. BTW would it be good to scan it for Bitsavers? I could easily do that as it's a ring binder and my newly acquired scanner is hungry for paper... Good night with kind regards, Philipp From derschjo at mail.msu.edu Sun Mar 28 23:09:27 2010 From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 21:09:27 -0700 Subject: Northstar Horizon boot disks Message-ID: <4BB027F7.5050209@mail.msu.edu> Hi all -- I've spent the last couple nights searching in vain for the Northstar Horizon boot disks a listmember produced for me a few years back. I *swear* I had them in my hands not a month ago but now they are nowhere to be found. I'm worried they may have fallen into a box that got recycled. I've decided I want to get my Horizon running again now that I have a bit more spare time (my other current project, a '54 Nash Metropolitan, is now off to the body shop for some serious work) but I'm stuck without bootable media or any way to make my own, so I can't do much with it at the moment. Can anyone do me a favor and make me a copy of a couple of Horizon boot disks (CP/M or otherwise) for this machine? I have the MDS-AD3 double-density controller with a Shugart SA400 drive. (As a related aside, is there *anywhere* one can get hard-sectored 5.25" floppies these days?) Thanks as always, Josh From rodsmallwood at btconnect.com Sun Mar 28 23:27:50 2010 From: rodsmallwood at btconnect.com (Rod Smallwood) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 05:27:50 +0100 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <9D1713A75397403BAE272481D4C0768F@RodsDevSystem> Just what I have been looking for but too far away.... Regards ? Rod Smallwood ? ? -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Andy Cheel Sent: 28 March 2010 07:15 To: cctech at classiccmp.org Subject: Re: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic Hi Dave, Interested to read about your Northstar S100 bus computer I have two of these withdual 51/4 disk drives sitting in my shed here in Adelaide South Australia I think I also have some manuals and software somewhere in the shed as well Are these of any value ? I also have some DEC desktop comuters and screens, disk units and tape units along with some operating software Kind regards Andy Cheel From cclist at sydex.com Mon Mar 29 00:12:28 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 22:12:28 -0700 Subject: Northstar Horizon boot disks In-Reply-To: <4BB027F7.5050209@mail.msu.edu> References: <4BB027F7.5050209@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: <4BAFD44C.22470.2A328E1@cclist.sydex.com> On 28 Mar 2010 at 21:09, Josh Dersch wrote: > (As a related aside, is there *anywhere* one can get hard-sectored > 5.25" floppies these days?) You might drop the folks at Athana a line. They *used* to provide hard sector diskettes on request; maybe they still do: http://www.athana.com/html/inquiry.html Cheers, Chuck From acheel at internode.on.net Sun Mar 28 01:14:48 2010 From: acheel at internode.on.net (Andy Cheel) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 16:44:48 +1030 Subject: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic Message-ID: Hi Dave, Interested to read about your Northstar S100 bus computer I have two of these withdual 51/4 disk drives sitting in my shed here in Adelaide South Australia I think I also have some manuals and software somewhere in the shed as well Are these of any value ? I also have some DEC desktop comuters and screens, disk units and tape units along with some operating software Kind regards Andy Cheel From blackmd at gmail.com Sun Mar 28 15:27:56 2010 From: blackmd at gmail.com (Michael Black) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 16:27:56 -0400 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom Message-ID: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Hello cctech community, I am a computer science professor and an avid collector and restorer of old computers, which I routinely use in my classes. (I am also a long-time lurker on cctech, but haven't posted much yet, I'm afraid.) I am interested in chatting with other professors and teachers who use working demonstrations of vintage technology in their classes. I am aware of many cases where professors have taught courses on computer history, used pictures and simulations of vintage computers, or took students on field trips to computer museums. However, I am particularly interested in examples where professors bring actual working vintage equipment into the classroom (like a pdp-11 or a teletype machine) and tried to teach their students to operate it. Has anybody on this list tried it or know of people who do it? Thanks, Michael Black From blackmd at gmail.com Sun Mar 28 15:29:01 2010 From: blackmd at gmail.com (Michael Black) Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 16:29:01 -0400 Subject: Hamurabi Focal source Message-ID: <496c74471003281329r42e4111aw94d253980dbdcfde@mail.gmail.com> On a not entirely unrelated note to my last email, does anybody know where I can obtain the original Focal source code to the game Hamurabi? I have a pdp-8e that I restored and have running Focal, but I have been unsuccessful in finding this classic game (apart from Ahl's Basic version.) Thanks in advance, Michael From useddec at gmail.com Mon Mar 29 02:28:04 2010 From: useddec at gmail.com (Paul Anderson) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 02:28:04 -0500 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <624966d61003290028j5729cbfau73a458a341fb2457@mail.gmail.com> Hi Michael, I used to run a Boy Scout merit badge seminar, and we would have close to 500 scouts from all over Illinois and some from Indiana attend. We had access to a school with about 20 classrooms, and had MTD buses to take scouts to classes at the U of I and other places. I took core stacks, paper tapes, disc platters, etc in for the the computer merit badge, and from what I heard , the student got a lot out of the items. Profs and grad student taught a lot of the courses, and the aviation class even had a wind tunnel. Paul On Sun, Mar 28, 2010 at 3:27 PM, Michael Black wrote: > Hello cctech community, > > I am a computer science professor and an avid collector and restorer > of old computers, which I routinely use in my classes. (I am also a > long-time lurker on cctech, but haven't posted much yet, I'm afraid.) > I am interested in chatting with other professors and teachers who use > working demonstrations of vintage technology in their classes. I am > aware of many cases where professors have taught courses on computer > history, used pictures and simulations of vintage computers, or took > students on field trips to computer museums. However, I am > particularly interested in examples where professors bring actual > working vintage equipment into the classroom (like a pdp-11 or a > teletype machine) and tried to teach their students to operate it. > Has anybody on this list tried it or know of people who do it? > > Thanks, > Michael Black > From dave09 at dunfield.com Mon Mar 29 06:12:22 2010 From: dave09 at dunfield.com (Dave Dunfield) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 06:12:22 -0500 Subject: Northstar Horizon boot disks In-Reply-To: <4BB027F7.5050209@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: <12A20EC40EF5@dunfield.com> > Hi all -- > > I've spent the last couple nights searching in vain for the Northstar > Horizon boot disks a listmember produced for me a few years back. I > *swear* I had them in my hands not a month ago but now they are nowhere > to be found. I'm worried they may have fallen into a box that got recycled. > > I've decided I want to get my Horizon running again now that I have a > bit more spare time (my other current project, a '54 Nash Metropolitan, > is now off to the body shop for some serious work) but I'm stuck without > bootable media or any way to make my own, so I can't do much with it at > the moment. > > Can anyone do me a favor and make me a copy of a couple of Horizon boot > disks (CP/M or otherwise) for this machine? I have the MDS-AD3 > double-density controller with a Shugart SA400 drive. Just an FYI - it is possible to recreate these on your own. I have a fairly large collection of NorthStar system disk images archived on my site. You can run them on my Horizon simulator (also on my site), and I have provided a tool to transfer the disk images over a serial cable to a Horizon system running a client which will write them to physical media. If you take the time to get this running, it will give you several versions of NorthStar DOS, CP/M and UCSD pascal, as well as a number of applications. The client runs under NorthStar DOS, and can be transferred into the system using the NorthStar monitor (I provide a tool that can do this). If you have a running N*DOS system, it should be pretty easy to get it all working. Bootstrapping a Horizon if you don't have a working boot disk is tricky, but it can be done - the main issue with a Horizon is "how to I get the code into the system" - because there is no front panel or ROM monitor. Fortunately there is a 1K ROM socket on the NorthStar CPU card. I can provide a little (500 byte) monitor which will provide basic read/write memory commands, and the tool mentioned above can be configured to "type" data into this monitor as well - I have pre-configured in-ram images of both single and double density NorthStar DOS with my client which can be transferred into the system and launched using this little ROM monitor. Then you use the PC "NST" tool to transfer a boot disk image to physical media. An added bonus is that the ROM monitor does not use any RAM, makes it useful for debugging nearly-dead systems as well. The "hard part" in all this is that you have to have or find someone who has the capability to program code into an EPROM, > (As a related aside, is there *anywhere* one can get hard-sectored 5.25" > floppies these days?) You might check with the Heathkit H8 guys - It's been a while since I have monitored that list, but I know that a couple of times in the past someone on that list has organized a bulk order of 5.25" HS disks. You could also program a little microcontroller to time the index pulses and "fake" the sector pulses, thereby allowing the use of much-more-common soft-sector disks - A few people have done this over the years, and I think at one point someone was offering a little board to do it. Dave -- dave09 (at) Dave Dunfield dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com com Classic Computers: http://www.classiccmp.org/dunfield/ From ragooman at comcast.net Mon Mar 29 05:51:56 2010 From: ragooman at comcast.net (Dan Roganti) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 06:51:56 -0400 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BB0864C.9050208@comcast.net> Michael Black wrote: > Hello cctech community, > > I am a computer science professor and an avid collector and restorer > of old computers, which I routinely use in my classes. (I am also a > long-time lurker on cctech, but haven't posted much yet, I'm afraid.) > I am interested in chatting with other professors and teachers who use > working demonstrations of vintage technology in their classes. I am > aware of many cases where professors have taught courses on computer > history, used pictures and simulations of vintage computers, or took > students on field trips to computer museums. However, I am > particularly interested in examples where professors bring actual > working vintage equipment into the classroom (like a pdp-11 or a > teletype machine) and tried to teach their students to operate it. > Has anybody on this list tried it or know of people who do it? > You should contact Bill Degnan from vintagecomputer.net. He teaches a class just like this at Univ.Delaware with hands-on instruction using vintage computers. =Dan http://www.vintagecomputer.net/ragooman/ From ICS65 at sbcglobal.net Mon Mar 29 09:33:50 2010 From: ICS65 at sbcglobal.net (George Wiegand) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 10:33:50 -0400 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <41F7F3798FE0464CBBF56A82B57996AF@ecs40ks4zrtt7t> I appreciate the idea. Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom > Hello cctech community, > > I am a computer science professor and an avid collector and restorer > of old computers, which I routinely use in my classes. (I am also a > long-time lurker on cctech, but haven't posted much yet, I'm afraid.) > I am interested in chatting with other professors and teachers who use > working demonstrations of vintage technology in their classes. I am > aware of many cases where professors have taught courses on computer > history, used pictures and simulations of vintage computers, or took > students on field trips to computer museums. However, I am > particularly interested in examples where professors bring actual > working vintage equipment into the classroom (like a pdp-11 or a > teletype machine) and tried to teach their students to operate it. > Has anybody on this list tried it or know of people who do it? > > Thanks, > Michael Black From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 29 10:07:56 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 11:07:56 -0400 Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: <4BAFD37D.6080008@philpem.me.uk> References: <4BAFC1EB.4010007@philpem.me.uk> <4BAFD37D.6080008@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <7459D187-BD97-430B-90A1-C36FE44B9915@neurotica.com> On Mar 28, 2010, at 6:09 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote: >> I'll happily sell him a copy of Linux for USD $1MIL. Then it'll >> be REALLY good, right? > > Well, I can't see that being a problem, as long as you include the > source code 8^P ;) > He's in the doghouse anyway... apparently the software for his Zune > deletes the file from the disc when you remove something from the > "music collection". Doesn't even ask if you want to delete them, > and doesn't go through the Recycle Bin either. Such an amazing > decision could only come from The Beast of Redmond. > > The clincher is that he mounted the MUSIC share on the fileserver > as a drive on his PC... then set that as his Zune Collection > folder. You can guess what happened. "Oh, I don't like Status Quo, > Queen or Goo Goo Dolls.. *delete*. Tina Dico? *delete*"... I now > have 14 albums that need re-ripping or buying again as MP3s from > Amazon (some of them were originally bought from iTunes when it was > the "only game in town".. and then promptly had the DRM stripped > with MyFairTunes). > > You can insult me all you like, but deleting stuff from //FILESHARE/ > MUSIC... that's taking a serious disregard for one's safety. > Especially when I warned him not to point the Zune software at the > music share..... At this point he'll be lucky if he gets his LAN > connection back. Or I might connect him back up through a 10Mbit > hub with a machine constantly blasting out garbage packets - that > could be fun :-) Wow. Just...wow. >> What a moron. No offense (to you) intended. > > See above. 8^) Indeed. :-( -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From marvin at west.net Mon Mar 29 12:18:43 2010 From: marvin at west.net (Marvin Johnston) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 10:18:43 -0700 Subject: cctalk Digest, Vol 79, Issue 56 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BB0E0F3.9020704@west.net> From: Josh Dersch > (As a related aside, is there *anywhere* one can get hard-sectored 5.25" > floppies these days?) People have been known to make their own 5 1/4" hard-sectored disks. I don't remember the details, but the basic idea was to take a 5 1/4" disk drive to hold the disk, make an index wheel for the holes, add a hole punch, and then just add time. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Mar 29 12:38:24 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 13:38:24 -0400 Subject: cctalk Digest, Vol 79, Issue 56 In-Reply-To: <4BB0E0F3.9020704@west.net> References: <4BB0E0F3.9020704@west.net> Message-ID: On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 1:18 PM, Marvin Johnston wrote: > > From: Josh Dersch > >> (As a related aside, is there *anywhere* one can get hard-sectored 5.25" >> floppies these days?) > > People have been known to make their own 5 1/4" hard-sectored disks. I don't > remember the details, but the basic idea was to take a 5 1/4" disk drive to > hold the disk, make an index wheel for the holes, add a hole punch, and then > just add time. One thought I had was to take an old 5.25" floppy frame (say an SA400), replace the DC motor with a stepper, mount a floppy disc, then drive the rotation so many steps (you'd have to calculate/measure the pulley ratio), then punch the media. Simple stepper drivers are inexpensive to buy ($20, say) or make and easy to drive from a microcontroller or parallel port (or even 555, if you wanted to do it "old school"). It'd be even "better" to have a laser make the hole, but that's a lot of power to be squirting around - punches for mylar rarely make holes in someone's retina. If it's too tricky to mount the punch or die in the floppy frame, one could pulse the media around as required and dot the spot with a sharpie, then eject the floppy and punch the holes by hand. -ethan From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 29 12:57:13 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:57:13 +0100 (BST) Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> from "Michael Black" at Mar 28, 10 04:27:56 pm Message-ID: > students on field trips to computer museums. However, I am > particularly interested in examples where professors bring actual > working vintage equipment into the classroom (like a pdp-11 or a > teletype machine) and tried to teach their students to operate it. > Has anybody on this list tried it or know of people who do it? I am not a lecturer (or whatever you wish to call it), so I can't give actual experience. But some years ago now I was present at a set of 8 talks given to a student computer society about the design and operation of an 'real' processor board. Said processor consisted of about 260 chips, TTL, PALs, 2900 series, etc and was analused to gate level in most cases. I think every last IC was mentioned somewhere. I feel that many students could understand the design of a sime minicomputer processor (top of my list, becauase it is simple and well-docuemtned would be the PDP8/e) And IMHO there is no better way to understand how a processor really owrks than to analyse a real processor, and thus get to see all the detials (much as IMHO the best operating systems cources examine the source code of an actual OS). -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 29 13:03:35 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 19:03:35 +0100 (BST) Subject: Disc analyser update (2010-03-27) In-Reply-To: <4BAFC1EB.4010007@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 28, 10 09:54:03 pm Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > > Mroe seriously, I am wodnerign why the shed is the only place where you= > =20 > > can use a soldering iron. Don;t you have a kitchen table? > > I do. There are a few problems with its use: > 1) It's currently covered in fruit, veg and other similar food product= > s. A soldering iron stand doesn't take up much space :-) > > 2) Said table is in close proximity to a cage which is home to a=20 > breeding pair of chinchillas (and two 3-month-old kits). Mum doesn't=20 > want them exposed to solder fumes and random volatile chemicals. Ah... Actually, I don;t think soldering fume would do them any harm, but I don't really know. > > 3) There's an active ban on the use of soldering irons in the kitchen=20 > after I burned a hole in the lino a few years ago. In my defence, it=20 > would have been a smaller hole if the blasted fire extinguisher had=20 > actually worked! OK, what about your bedroom? If necessary work on a wooden board on the bed (I have done this). Or work on the floor (assuming the floor is not covered in bits of classic computers). > Little hint: second-hand safety equipment is a false economy. Dad=20 > The garage might be an option, if I can get the car out of there (once=20 > again requiring the approval of the Luddite In Charge) and find a table=20 > and a space-heater. I sure as hell wouldn't try and lug the 16500B and a=20 > PC out there though, so debugging options might be, shall we say "limited > ". Couldn't you move the LA out there and leave it there for the moment? Or is the garage too small to house a workbench and the car? Of course portable PCs exist, so that should be less of a problem. > > I've got him browsing the Internet on a Linux laptop so he's not a total=20 > Luddite, although the concept of a PVR is lost on him... > > "It's like a video recorder but it's better quality, has a programme=20 > guide and you can do Series Link so you don't have to keep reprogramming=20 > it every week" > "So what was wrong with the video recorder?" OK, can you please explain why a PVR is so much better than a VCR. I have never had my enjoyment of a TV programme spoiled by poor resoultion (bad acting, non-existant plot, etc sure) And as everyone here knows, I would much rather repair an N1500 than a PVR. > > Although curiously, despite having done a basic computer course that=20 > mandated the use of Windows, he picked up the basics of using Linux=20 > quicker than my younger brother. Said brother is still point-blank=20 > refusing to even try Linux because "if they have to give it away for=20 I wasn;'t aware you couldn't sell linux for whatever price you felt like. Can't you sell him a linux CD that costs twice the price of a Windows license? > free then it must be crap". And yet he uses Firefox, Thunderbird,=20 > OpenOffice, and a ton of other OSS/FS stuff. Hypocrisy in action. > > Some days it's not worth chewing through the leather straps in the mornin= > g. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Mar 29 13:14:21 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 19:14:21 +0100 (BST) Subject: Servo tracks on SMD disk In-Reply-To: <4BB01491.8070307@hachti.de> from "Philipp Hachtmann" at Mar 29, 10 04:46:41 am Message-ID: > > Hi Tony, > > > Based on my experiences with Pentina, I don't believe a cat makes a > > unique sound... > You're speaking of the individuality of a DOG! A cat makes miau! :-) I am sure Pentina is a cat. And he certainly males many different noises... > > > > > Anyway, I assume you know it's not headcrashing (which can make a noise > > like a very angry cat). I think you'd know if that was the case... > No crash. But I have to admit that I got the drive crashed a few years > ago. After cleaning and using another pack it worked. I had 3 packs for it. I assuem it has worked since the crash. Could the heads have been damaged by the crash? > At some point in history I got a bunch of packs. They were used with a > somewhat dubious Nova clone system (DDC or DCC). They never really > worked fine. > A few months ago now the drive completely broke down: After having > successfully used the machine for several hours and pausing for another > few weeks, I ran into disaster: A mechanical buffer at the back of the > head slide had changed to a sticky liquid and blocked the whole > mechanism. That resulted in the heads staying on disk while the drive > did an urgency spindown. Hang on.. Are you saing the heads landed on the disk? And that the drive hasn't worked properly since that? I really wonder if the heads have been damaged. > I disassembled the whole thing and cleaned away the mess as good as > possible. I did not touch the head alignment. The heads stayed bolted to > their slide and were taken aside as a whole block. I also took care for > the heads not getting in contact. > This week I reassembled the drive and tried it out. The cartridge that > was in the drive during the disaster was far gone and runs with > "pre-crash" noise. > I realized that I had only the dubious packs. Some of them as I found > out yesterday can be formatted by the Emulex SC02 controller's low level > format routine, some stop shortly before the end (as I explained > before). When I then try to use them, I can run "INIT/BADBLOCKS" under > RT11 which says no bad blocks. Then when copying data in, I get write > errors and bad blocks. Number increases. They stay and are in the system > area most of the time. So I cannot use the packs :-( > The whole procedure can be repeated using the low-level formatting > routine and then RT11 INIT. OK... The formatting routine must move the heads across the disk surface, and it will read (but not write) the servo surface. Can you 'scope the output of the srrvo preamplifier while it's doing this? See if the signal changes in amplitude or whatever. > > That leads to the idea that there's something wrong about the data as well. > > > > This sounds somewhat similar in concept to the CDC 'Phoenix' drive. > > There's a separate servo surface for the remvoable pack (one servo, one > > data), and the 3 fixed disks (1 servo, 5 data surfaces). > Exactly. But there are differences. I don't think there's any oil-filled damper on the Phoenix. > > > > > What do you mean by 'outer' tracks? Normally, I would take that to mean > > ones closest to the edge of the disk, but it appears you mean ones neares > > the spindle. > Sorry, meant "inner", of course! I was tiredly writing in foreign English... OK. I was just making sureI knew where the problem area was. > > > Do you have schematics and a 'scope? > Yes. But... Sorry for saying that: That machine has a very very low > priority in my project queue as it's something from the 80s. I currently OK... Alas I suspect this is not going to be a quick fix. > have enough older stuff to repair (RK05s, TU56s, PDP8/I, PDP8/Ls, > Honeywell DDP-516 and H316 reconfiguration and testing, etc.). I just > wanted to get it either working and back in the rack or out of the > window (i.e. give it to someone else, NOT trashing it!). > > > What about any velocity > > feedback signal? > Speed might be worth a thought: > - If running too slow, servo and data head read levels might be low. I > doubt that it's that but this could serve as an explanation for servo > AND data problems. No, I was thinking of the positiuoner velocity signal. Most hard disk positioner servoos use a signal that depends on the speed of head movement (nothing to do with the rotating disk). It helps to stabilise the servo loop. > > That would have been an early guess of mine (lost of > > this can make the servo unstable), but why would it only affect the > > removeable pack? > I'm not 100% sure but I think to remember that the fixed and the > removable disk use separate motors. At least I remember a power plug > labelled "motor 2"! That is certainly not a Phoenis. The Phoenics has ome spindle motor for all the disks and one positioner that moves all the heads. > > > Can you look at the output of the servo head preamplifer when using the > > fixed disk (which works correctly) and the remveable disk? > I'll try to. > > > Step one > > cylinder at a time going towards the 'bad' part and see if you can notice > > any changes in the signal. > I have nothing to single step the drive. No exerciser and no pdp11 You could use the formatter routine for this. > programming experience (yet, will come when I get to resurrect the > 11/20). And there's that Emulex controller between the pdp and the I don't know the controller you are using. Is is an MSCP one? If not, then moving the heads should just be a matter of puttign the right numbers inthe controller registers, something that you can do with the frontpanel or Console ODT. > drive. That remaps the disk afaik. > > > I do have a CDC Phoenix service manual, if you think the drives are > > related I can take a look... > I have the complete manual with schematics sitting here. > BTW would it be good to scan it for Bitsavers? I could easily do that as > it's a ring binder and my newly acquired scanner is hungry for paper... Well, it would have the advantage that I could (somehow) get to look at it and might have more suggestions :-) -tony From IanK at vulcan.com Mon Mar 29 14:25:11 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 12:25:11 -0700 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Michael Black > Sent: Sunday, March 28, 2010 1:28 PM > To: cctech at classiccmp.org > Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom > > Hello cctech community, > > I am a computer science professor and an avid collector and restorer > of old computers, which I routinely use in my classes. (I am also a > long-time lurker on cctech, but haven't posted much yet, I'm afraid.) > I am interested in chatting with other professors and teachers who use > working demonstrations of vintage technology in their classes. I am > aware of many cases where professors have taught courses on computer > history, used pictures and simulations of vintage computers, or took > students on field trips to computer museums. However, I am > particularly interested in examples where professors bring actual > working vintage equipment into the classroom (like a pdp-11 or a > teletype machine) and tried to teach their students to operate it. > Has anybody on this list tried it or know of people who do it? > > Thanks, > Michael Black We've started giving lectures at the University of Washington in its Information School (iSchool). We found that the match between what we're doing and the existing academic program was better than that with computer science since, as Dijkstra once said, "Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes." However, the iSchool folks are interested in the evolution of information technology and how it has enabled progress in information and library science. We're still in our first steps, and haven't made a lot of use of vintage systems in the classroom (although I do like to bring along my PDP-8/f, just to demonstrate what a desktop computer looked like in 1970). We are creating plans for homework that would have the students working with our online PDP-10 and/or VAX-11 machines. I'd also like to have projects requiring them to use a system with nothing but paper tape for mass storage. But we do get the students 'in the room' with vintage machines, by providing tours of the Living Computer Museum that build on the substance of the lectures. It really does make an impact when they stand in front of a history-making machine like the PDP-7 or see DECtape in action. We tie it into modern equivalents whenever possible - for instance, I refer to DECtape as the 'USB stick of 1970'. Comments have been overwhelmingly positive. -- Ian From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Mar 29 14:52:24 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 15:52:24 -0400 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 3:25 PM, Ian King wrote: > We're still in our first steps, and haven't made a lot of use of vintage systems in the classroom (although I do like to bring along my PDP-8/f, just to demonstrate what a desktop computer looked like in 1970). If you have a moving van, you could bring a DataSystem 310 (PDP-8/a w/RX02) to show that in 1978, a desktop computer was so-called because it came with its own desk. ;-) The Straight-8, the -8/S, the -8/L and the -8/e all had "desktop" configurations as well as rackable configurations (i.e. - factory-made desktop covers (black metal except for the Straight-8, which was smoked plexi), but I think the other models of PDP-8 only had rackable packages (not that you couldn't leave a PDP-8 out on a desk, but in terms of aesthetics, vents, mounting ears, etc., they weren't "desk pretty"). Still - the -8/f is more portable than an -8/e and does make the point that I imagine you are trying to make (though anything more than the CPU enclosure and a TTY starts to stretch the definition of "desktop", especially if you start stacking rackable boxes for external disk or DECtape or papertape - those weren't in desktop enclosures in 1970 AFAIK). -ethan From derschjo at mail.msu.edu Mon Mar 29 14:53:29 2010 From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 12:53:29 -0700 Subject: Northstar Horizon boot disks In-Reply-To: <12A20EC40EF5@dunfield.com> References: <12A20EC40EF5@dunfield.com> Message-ID: <4BB10539.6070703@mail.msu.edu> Dave Dunfield wrote: >> Hi all -- >> >> I've spent the last couple nights searching in vain for the Northstar >> Horizon boot disks a listmember produced for me a few years back. I >> *swear* I had them in my hands not a month ago but now they are nowhere >> to be found. I'm worried they may have fallen into a box that got recycled. >> >> I've decided I want to get my Horizon running again now that I have a >> bit more spare time (my other current project, a '54 Nash Metropolitan, >> is now off to the body shop for some serious work) but I'm stuck without >> bootable media or any way to make my own, so I can't do much with it at >> the moment. >> >> Can anyone do me a favor and make me a copy of a couple of Horizon boot >> disks (CP/M or otherwise) for this machine? I have the MDS-AD3 >> double-density controller with a Shugart SA400 drive. >> > > Just an FYI - it is possible to recreate these on your own. I have a fairly > large collection of NorthStar system disk images archived on my site. > > You can run them on my Horizon simulator (also on my site), and I have provided > a tool to transfer the disk images over a serial cable to a Horizon system > running a client which will write them to physical media. If you take the time > to get this running, it will give you several versions of NorthStar DOS, CP/M > and UCSD pascal, as well as a number of applications. > > The client runs under NorthStar DOS, and can be transferred into the system > using the NorthStar monitor (I provide a tool that can do this). If you have > a running N*DOS system, it should be pretty easy to get it all working. > > Bootstrapping a Horizon if you don't have a working boot disk is tricky, but > it can be done - the main issue with a Horizon is "how to I get the code into > the system" - because there is no front panel or ROM monitor. Fortunately > there is a 1K ROM socket on the NorthStar CPU card. I can provide a little > (500 byte) monitor which will provide basic read/write memory commands, and > the tool mentioned above can be configured to "type" data into this monitor > as well - I have pre-configured in-ram images of both single and double > density NorthStar DOS with my client which can be transferred into the system > and launched using this little ROM monitor. Then you use the PC "NST" tool > to transfer a boot disk image to physical media. > > An added bonus is that the ROM monitor does not use any RAM, makes it useful > for debugging nearly-dead systems as well. The "hard part" in all this is that > you have to have or find someone who has the capability to program code into > an EPROM, > Cool. I actually have a few 2708s lying around but I don't think my programmer will write them (I think 2716s are the lower limit). Ironically, I have a Piiceon "8K program saver" that will (assuming it's working and I can find documentation) do the job but of course I don't have a working S100 machine to use it in :). So I now have a second request: Can anyone program a 2708 (or two) for me, assuming I supply the chips? (I'd just adapt a 2716, but I don't have any...) > > >> (As a related aside, is there *anywhere* one can get hard-sectored 5.25" >> floppies these days?) >> > > You might check with the Heathkit H8 guys - It's been a while since I have > monitored that list, but I know that a couple of times in the past someone > on that list has organized a bulk order of 5.25" HS disks. > Thanks, I'll check around there. > You could also program a little microcontroller to time the index > pulses and "fake" the sector pulses, thereby allowing the use of > much-more-common soft-sector disks - A few people have done this > over the years, and I think at one point someone was offering a > little board to do it. > That also sounds like a fun option... once I verify that the machine works with real media, this seems like the way to go. Thanks! Josh > Dave > > > -- > dave09 (at) Dave Dunfield > dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com > com Classic Computers: http://www.classiccmp.org/dunfield/ > > > From IanK at vulcan.com Mon Mar 29 15:14:45 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 13:14:45 -0700 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Ethan Dicks > Sent: Monday, March 29, 2010 12:52 PM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Using vintage computers in the classroom > > On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 3:25 PM, Ian King wrote: > > We're still in our first steps, and haven't made a lot of use of > vintage systems in the classroom (although I do like to bring along my > PDP-8/f, just to demonstrate what a desktop computer looked like in > 1970). > > If you have a moving van, you could bring a DataSystem 310 (PDP-8/a > w/RX02) to show that in 1978, a desktop computer was so-called because > it came with its own desk. ;-) > True, true. > The Straight-8, the -8/S, the -8/L and the -8/e all had "desktop" > configurations as well as rackable configurations (i.e. - factory-made > desktop covers (black metal except for the Straight-8, which was > smoked plexi), but I think the other models of PDP-8 only had rackable > packages (not that you couldn't leave a PDP-8 out on a desk, but in > terms of aesthetics, vents, mounting ears, etc., they weren't "desk > pretty"). > > Still - the -8/f is more portable than an -8/e and does make the point > that I imagine you are trying to make (though anything more than the > CPU enclosure and a TTY starts to stretch the definition of "desktop", > especially if you start stacking rackable boxes for external disk or > DECtape or papertape - those weren't in desktop enclosures in 1970 > AFAIK). > > -ethan You're right, and the point of using an 8/f is that I walk into the room with it on a little luggage cart and lift it onto the desk, plug it in and fire it up. Of course, without a terminal of some sort as well as mass storage (minimally a paper tape reader), it's not much use. But all of that is a good starting point to talk about how computers became more and more accessible to the individual across that era. There was nothing like it ten years earlier. -- Ian From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Mar 29 15:26:27 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 16:26:27 -0400 Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: <496c74471003281329r42e4111aw94d253980dbdcfde@mail.gmail.com> References: <496c74471003281329r42e4111aw94d253980dbdcfde@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Sun, Mar 28, 2010 at 4:29 PM, Michael Black wrote: > On a not entirely unrelated note to my last email, does anybody know > where I can obtain the original Focal source code to the game > Hamurabi? ?I have a pdp-8e that I restored and have running Focal, but > I have been unsuccessful in finding this classic game (apart from > Ahl's Basic version.) I have it on an original DECUS papertape, IIRC (http://archive.netbsd.se/?ml=cctalk&a=2004-01&m=144185 - yep... there I am talking about it ;-) You might be after DECUS tape FOCAL8-5 - "The Sumer Game" The writeup is: DECUS NO. FOCAL8-5 The Sumer Game Doug Dyment, Digital Equipment of Canada, Ltd., Carleton Place, Canada This is a simulation program/game which will run on a minimal PDP-8 system. The economy of a Sumerian city in the year 3000 B. C. is simulated in the fashion of a modern-day "business game." I tried googling for DECUS papertapes online, but did not find anything with a casual search. The Wikipedia entry does echo the credits for the original version to Doug Dyment (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamurabi), but doesn't have a link to FOCAL code. Perhaps someone on the list has a tar file full of digitized DECUS papertapes? -ethan From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Mar 29 15:35:27 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 16:35:27 -0400 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 4:14 PM, Ian King wrote: >> On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 3:25 PM, Ian King wrote: >> > We're still in our first steps, and haven't made a lot of use of >> vintage systems in the classroom (although I do like to bring along my >> PDP-8/f, just to demonstrate what a desktop computer looked like in >> 1970). . . . > You're right, and the point of using an 8/f is that I walk into the room with it > on a little luggage cart and lift it onto the desk, plug it in and fire it up. Indeed. If you had one to haul around, an -8/L with a desktop lid would be heavier and larger than an -8/f (similar to an 8/e), but be a reflection of the same sort of thing in 1968... a desktop computer for under $10,000! (as was once advertised, IIRC) > ?Of course, without a terminal of some sort as well as mass storage (minimally a paper tape reader), it's > not much use. Sure - I can't imagine that there were many PDP-8s that didn't at least have an ASR-33. If you have access to one that's in the tabletop (not pedestal mount) configuration, it might not be too hard to wheel that plus your -8/f (or an -8/L) on that luggage cart - as long as you don't tip the ASR-33 too far off of vertical, naturally. A 4K machine plus ASR-33 (w/PTR) is enough to at least demonstrate FOCAL. If it has core (all -8/L models did, but I don't recall if the -8/f has the right PSU for core), you can even just turn it on and have it start chattering - instant resume from hibernate! > ?But all of that is a good starting point to talk about how computers became more and more accessible to the individual across that era. ?There was nothing like it ten years earlier. ?-- Ian Sure, 10 years earlier, but there was something like that two years earlier, and perhaps 5-6 years earlier (the PDP-8/S, though I'm not sure what you could reasonable show off with a 4K tabletop unit since the TTY interface is external). Fiddly details aside, it's still cool to wheel in a "personal computer" from the era and watch the audience gape - I've done that with my -8/L. -ethan From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Mar 29 15:44:12 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 16:44:12 -0400 Subject: Northstar Horizon boot disks In-Reply-To: <4BB10539.6070703@mail.msu.edu> References: <12A20EC40EF5@dunfield.com> <4BB10539.6070703@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: On Mar 29, 2010, at 3:53 PM, Josh Dersch wrote: > Cool. I actually have a few 2708s lying around but I don't think > my programmer will write them (I think 2716s are the lower limit). > Ironically, I have a Piiceon "8K program saver" that will (assuming > it's working and I can find documentation) do the job but of course > I don't have a working S100 machine to use it in :). > > So I now have a second request: Can anyone program a 2708 (or two) > for me, assuming I supply the chips? (I'd just adapt a 2716, but I > don't have any...) I can program 2708s, and I need to ship you a box soon anyway. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From dkelvey at hotmail.com Mon Mar 29 16:19:19 2010 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 14:19:19 -0700 Subject: Northstar Horizon boot disks In-Reply-To: <4BB10539.6070703@mail.msu.edu> References: <12A20EC40EF5@dunfield.com>,<4BB10539.6070703@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: > Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 12:53:29 -0700 > From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu ---snip--- > > > > > >> (As a related aside, is there *anywhere* one can get hard-sectored 5.25" > >> floppies these days?) > >> > > > > You might check with the Heathkit H8 guys - It's been a while since I have > > monitored that list, but I know that a couple of times in the past someone > > on that list has organized a bulk order of 5.25" HS disks. > > > Thanks, I'll check around there. > > > You could also program a little microcontroller to time the index > > pulses and "fake" the sector pulses, thereby allowing the use of > > much-more-common soft-sector disks - A few people have done this > > over the years, and I think at one point someone was offering a > > little board to do it. > > > That also sounds like a fun option... once I verify that the machine > works with real media, this seems like the way to go. > > Thanks! > Josh Hi Josh I punch my own disk. I have an old frame from a SA400 that I use for this purpose. I have pictures on the googles group for SEBHC ( the Heathkit 8 bit group ). It is slow but works if you have a pile of 360K disk. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ The New Busy is not the old busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_3 From IanK at vulcan.com Mon Mar 29 17:40:51 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 15:40:51 -0700 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Ethan Dicks > Sent: Monday, March 29, 2010 1:35 PM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Using vintage computers in the classroom > > > Sure - I can't imagine that there were many PDP-8s that didn't at > least have an ASR-33. If you have access to one that's in the > tabletop (not pedestal mount) configuration, it might not be too hard > to wheel that plus your -8/f (or an -8/L) on that luggage cart - as > long as you don't tip the ASR-33 too far off of vertical, naturally. > A 4K machine plus ASR-33 (w/PTR) is enough to at least demonstrate > FOCAL. If it has core (all -8/L models did, but I don't recall if the > -8/f has the right PSU for core), you can even just turn it on and > have it start chattering - instant resume from hibernate! > I'm running core in my 8/f. And you've given me an interesting idea: we don't have a tabletop ASR33, but we do have a KSR, and if FOCAL was already loaded.... Thanks! -- Ian From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Mar 29 17:51:21 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:51:21 -0400 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 6:40 PM, Ian King wrote: > I'm running core in my 8/f. ?And you've given me an interesting idea: we don't have a tabletop ASR33, but we do have a KSR, and if FOCAL was already loaded.... ?Thanks! ?-- Ian Excellent! That will certainly do something captivating. Hammurabi/Sumer might be a little long to type in live, but it shouldn't be hard to start with the right section of the Programming Handbook and bang out a 1-4-line FOCAL program to demonstrate how "fast" the machine is (Sieve of Eratosthenes anyone?) If you have the opportunity to video that rig running through its paces, I think it would be fun to see. You could upload it to YouTube as "Portable Computer from 1970". ;-) -ethan From doc at vaxen.net Mon Mar 29 18:46:31 2010 From: doc at vaxen.net (Doc Shipley) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:46:31 -0500 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4BB13BD7.7000405@vaxen.net> On 3/28/10 3:27 PM, Michael Black wrote: > Hello cctech community, > > I am a computer science professor and an avid collector and restorer > of old computers, which I routinely use in my classes. (I am also a > long-time lurker on cctech, but haven't posted much yet, I'm afraid.) > I am interested in chatting with other professors and teachers who use > working demonstrations of vintage technology in their classes. I am > aware of many cases where professors have taught courses on computer > history, used pictures and simulations of vintage computers, or took > students on field trips to computer museums. However, I am > particularly interested in examples where professors bring actual > working vintage equipment into the classroom (like a pdp-11 or a > teletype machine) and tried to teach their students to operate it. > Has anybody on this list tried it or know of people who do it? I taught UNIX/Linux basic security classes for IBM and RedHat for quite a few years. I often started the one-week session holding up a 3" x 4" piece of plexiglas with Velcro strips down the long sides, with a photo on the projector screen of my MicroPDP-11/53 with the corresponding Velcro down each side of the switch panel. "This is a security device. It's called a 'Molly guard'" and I'd explain the name (which made its function obvious). My real point was that "security", in its most basic sense, involves simply ensuring that data and function available to the user. It was a very good way to clear any cloak & dagger preconceptions and get students thinking about the most ubiquitous security issue - human error. Somehow that Molly guard, illustrating that security was a concern before some of my students existed, made my point very well. Doc From lynchaj at yahoo.com Mon Mar 29 19:27:28 2010 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 20:27:28 -0400 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Michael Black > Sent: Sunday, March 28, 2010 4:28 PM > To: cctech at classiccmp.org > Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom > > Hello cctech community, > > I am a computer science professor and an avid collector and restorer > of old computers, which I routinely use in my classes. (I am also a > long-time lurker on cctech, but haven't posted much yet, I'm afraid.) > I am interested in chatting with other professors and teachers who use > working demonstrations of vintage technology in their classes. I am > aware of many cases where professors have taught courses on computer > history, used pictures and simulations of vintage computers, or took > students on field trips to computer museums. However, I am > particularly interested in examples where professors bring actual > working vintage equipment into the classroom (like a pdp-11 or a > teletype machine) and tried to teach their students to operate it. > Has anybody on this list tried it or know of people who do it? > > Thanks, > Michael Black [AJL>] Hi! You are welcome to use the N8VEM project for educational purposes. I designed it with use in education as its primary purpose. It could be readily used to teach fundamental computer hardware and software principles in an easily illustrated manner. Starting with a blank sheet of paper and building up the basic conceptual elements in a process which results in a simple working microcomputer would be educational and highly entertaining. Add some devices like the ECB backplane and the ECB bus monitor and you can show the CPU operating in single step mode, the effects of reset, and all kinds of computer operation. The N8VEM SBC is simple and inexpensive enough that it can be built by beginners, as many are already, and normally works the first time. It works by itself interfacing to a serial port although it can be expanded to video boards, floppy and IDE disks, and even custom peripherals. http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com/ http://groups.google.com/group/n8vem I hope this helps. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch From toby at pdp11.co.uk Tue Mar 30 01:33:15 2010 From: toby at pdp11.co.uk (toby at pdp11.co.uk) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 06:33:15 +0000 Subject: Servo tracks on SMD disk Message-ID: <313886392-1269930781-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-1054415263-@bda2004.bisx.produk.on.blackberry> R ------Original Message------ From: Tony Duell Sender: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org To: cctalk at classiccmp.org ReplyTo: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Servo tracks on SMD disk Sent: 29 Mar 2010 19:14 > > Hi Tony, > > > Based on my experiences with Pentina, I don't believe a cat makes a > > unique sound... > You're speaking of the individuality of a DOG! A cat makes miau! :-) I am sure Pentina is a cat. And he certainly males many different noises... > > > > > Anyway, I assume you know it's not headcrashing (which can make a noise > > like a very angry cat). I think you'd know if that was the case... > No crash. But I have to admit that I got the drive crashed a few years > ago. After cleaning and using another pack it worked. I had 3 packs for it. I assuem it has worked since the crash. Could the heads have been damaged by the crash? > At some point in history I got a bunch of packs. They were used with a > somewhat dubious Nova clone system (DDC or DCC). They never really > worked fine. > A few months ago now the drive completely broke down: After having > successfully used the machine for several hours and pausing for another > few weeks, I ran into disaster: A mechanical buffer at the back of the > head slide had changed to a sticky liquid and blocked the whole > mechanism. That resulted in the heads staying on disk while the drive > did an urgency spindown. Hang on.. Are you saing the heads landed on the disk? And that the drive hasn't worked properly since that? I really wonder if the heads have been damaged. > I disassembled the whole thing and cleaned away the mess as good as > possible. I did not touch the head alignment. The heads stayed bolted to > their slide and were taken aside as a whole block. I also took care for > the heads not getting in contact. > This week I reassembled the drive and tried it out. The cartridge that > was in the drive during the disaster was far gone and runs with > "pre-crash" noise. > I realized that I had only the dubious packs. Some of them as I found > out yesterday can be formatted by the Emulex SC02 controller's low level > format routine, some stop shortly before the end (as I explained > before). When I then try to use them, I can run "INIT/BADBLOCKS" under > RT11 which says no bad blocks. Then when copying data in, I get write > errors and bad blocks. Number increases. They stay and are in the system > area most of the time. So I cannot use the packs :-( > The whole procedure can be repeated using the low-level formatting > routine and then RT11 INIT. OK... The formatting routine must move the heads across the disk surface, and it will read (but not write) the servo surface. Can you 'scope the output of the srrvo preamplifier while it's doing this? See if the signal changes in amplitude or whatever. > > That leads to the idea that there's something wrong about the data as well. > > > > This sounds somewhat similar in concept to the CDC 'Phoenix' drive. > > There's a separate servo surface for the remvoable pack (one servo, one > > data), and the 3 fixed disks (1 servo, 5 data surfaces). > Exactly. But there are differences. I don't think there's any oil-filled damper on the Phoenix. > > > > > What do you mean by 'outer' tracks? Normally, I would take that to mean > > ones closest to the edge of the disk, but it appears you mean ones neares > > the spindle. > Sorry, meant "inner", of course! I was tiredly writing in foreign English... OK. I was just making sureI knew where the problem area was. > > > Do you have schematics and a 'scope? > Yes. But... Sorry for saying that: That machine has a very very low > priority in my project queue as it's something from the 80s. I currently OK... Alas I suspect this is not going to be a quick fix. > have enough older stuff to repair (RK05s, TU56s, PDP8/I, PDP8/Ls, > Honeywell DDP-516 and H316 reconfiguration and testing, etc.). I just > wanted to get it either working and back in the rack or out of the > window (i.e. give it to someone else, NOT trashing it!). > > > What about any velocity > > feedback signal? > Speed might be worth a thought: > - If running too slow, servo and d Sent using BlackBerry? from Orange From chrise at pobox.com Mon Mar 29 07:26:15 2010 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 07:26:15 -0500 Subject: Northstar Horizon boot disks In-Reply-To: <12A20EC40EF5@dunfield.com> References: <4BB027F7.5050209@mail.msu.edu> <12A20EC40EF5@dunfield.com> Message-ID: <20100329122615.GK26787@n0jcf.net> On Monday (03/29/2010 at 06:12AM -0500), Dave Dunfield wrote: > > You might check with the Heathkit H8 guys - It's been a while since I have > monitored that list, but I know that a couple of times in the past someone > on that list has organized a bulk order of 5.25" HS disks. > > You could also program a little microcontroller to time the index > pulses and "fake" the sector pulses, thereby allowing the use of > much-more-common soft-sector disks - A few people have done this > over the years, and I think at one point someone was offering a > little board to do it. Yes... We did this for the H8/H89 10-hole, hard-sector floppies on the H-17/H-88-1 controller. I put an AVR microcontroller on a little board that synthesizes the index holes and uses 3.5" floppies. It's all written up here, http://sebhc.lesbird.com/storage/storage.html look for the "HSFE" Hard Sector Floppy Emulator Chris -- Chris Elmquist From charlesleecourtney at yahoo.com Mon Mar 29 12:46:04 2010 From: charlesleecourtney at yahoo.com (Lee Courtney) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 10:46:04 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <599148.31725.qm@web35306.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi Michael, I assume you have seen: http://fs6.depauw.edu:50080/~dharms/pdp11/ and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XV-7J5y1TQc Great idea BTW! Lee Courtney ________________________________ From: Michael Black To: cctech at classiccmp.org Sent: Sun, March 28, 2010 1:27:56 PM Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom Hello cctech community, I am a computer science professor and an avid collector and restorer of old computers, which I routinely use in my classes. (I am also a long-time lurker on cctech, but haven't posted much yet, I'm afraid.) I am interested in chatting with other professors and teachers who use working demonstrations of vintage technology in their classes. I am aware of many cases where professors have taught courses on computer history, used pictures and simulations of vintage computers, or took students on field trips to computer museums. However, I am particularly interested in examples where professors bring actual working vintage equipment into the classroom (like a pdp-11 or a teletype machine) and tried to teach their students to operate it. Has anybody on this list tried it or know of people who do it? Thanks, Michael Black From charlesleecourtney at yahoo.com Mon Mar 29 12:46:04 2010 From: charlesleecourtney at yahoo.com (Lee Courtney) Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 10:46:04 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> References: <496c74471003281327xec6da7ciad23fad31e7137d0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <599148.31725.qm@web35306.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi Michael, I assume you have seen: http://fs6.depauw.edu:50080/~dharms/pdp11/ and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XV-7J5y1TQc Great idea BTW! Lee Courtney ________________________________ From: Michael Black To: cctech at classiccmp.org Sent: Sun, March 28, 2010 1:27:56 PM Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom Hello cctech community, I am a computer science professor and an avid collector and restorer of old computers, which I routinely use in my classes. (I am also a long-time lurker on cctech, but haven't posted much yet, I'm afraid.) I am interested in chatting with other professors and teachers who use working demonstrations of vintage technology in their classes. I am aware of many cases where professors have taught courses on computer history, used pictures and simulations of vintage computers, or took students on field trips to computer museums. However, I am particularly interested in examples where professors bring actual working vintage equipment into the classroom (like a pdp-11 or a teletype machine) and tried to teach their students to operate it. Has anybody on this list tried it or know of people who do it? Thanks, Michael Black From dm561 at torfree.net Tue Mar 30 05:03:52 2010 From: dm561 at torfree.net (M H Stein) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 05:03:52 -0500 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) Message-ID: <01CACFC6.684C8540@MSE_D03> Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 18:00:33 +0100 From: Liam Proven Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) On Sun, Mar 28, 2010 at 5:26 AM, Joost van de Griek wrote: > On 26 March 2010 02:58, Liam Proven wrote: > >> On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 7:42 PM, Josh Dersch wrote: >> >>> I was thinking more of the battery in the original Mac Portable (which I >>> know is not what you're referring to). ?The portable weighed 16lbs, due in >>> no small part to the lead-acid battery it used. >> >> Yes, that was my guess, too. Only laptop-/style/ portable I ever even >> heard of with a lead-acid battery. > > PowerBook 100. Basically a repackaged Portable. --------------------------------------------------- The Sharp PC-5000 also had a lead-acid battery; according to them, L-A has a longer shelf life, charges faster, and is actually smaller and lighter for the same power than the NiCds of the day. mike From roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk Tue Mar 30 08:56:25 2010 From: roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk (Roger Holmes) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 14:56:25 +0100 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: > Message: 11 > Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 16:35:27 -0400 > From: Ethan Dicks > Subject: Re: Using vintage computers in the classroom > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > Message-ID: > > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > > On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 4:14 PM, Ian King wrote: >>> On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 3:25 PM, Ian King wrote: >>>> We're still in our first steps, and haven't made a lot of use of >>> vintage systems in the classroom (although I do like to bring along my >>> PDP-8/f, just to demonstrate what a desktop computer looked like in >>> 1970). > . > > Sure, 10 years earlier, but there was something like that two years > earlier, and perhaps 5-6 years earlier (the PDP-8/S, though I'm not > sure what you could reasonable show off with a 4K tabletop unit since > the TTY interface is external). > > Fiddly details aside, it's still cool to wheel in a "personal > computer" from the era and watch the audience gape - I've done that > with my -8/L. > > -ethan I can't describe the reactions of those who visit my classic car show and then walk into a barn and find a five ton 1962 mainframe working away twirling tapes, reading and punching 80 column cards, reading and punching paper tape whilst making ghostly noises through its built in speaker. I should maybe give them ear defenders because its so noisy and I haven't even displayed the 600 line per minute printer working yet until I fix it. The heat and smell of hot electronics is a bit overpowering too. I have never worked out where the smell comes from, is it gas escaping from the components, the paxolin or the solder/flux. I know a lot comes from the magnetic tapes, we had a walk in safe full of tape where I worked once and when it was opened after a month or two locked up it made a hell of a stink, like Tutenkamen's tomb. Good luck with the course. If you ever need a Apple Mac based simulator for a 1962 mainframe with an unusual architecture get in touch. Roger Holmes. Owner of ICT 1301 serial number 6, the first of at least 160 to leave the factory. The design was started in the late 1950s. From vrs at msn.com Tue Mar 30 09:35:41 2010 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 07:35:41 -0700 Subject: Hamurabi Focal source References: <496c74471003281329r42e4111aw94d253980dbdcfde@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: From: "Ethan Dicks" Monday, March 29, 2010 1:26 PM > On Sun, Mar 28, 2010 at 4:29 PM, Michael Black wrote: > > On a not entirely unrelated note to my last email, does anybody know > > where I can obtain the original Focal source code to the game > > Hamurabi? I have a pdp-8e that I restored and have running Focal, but > > I have been unsuccessful in finding this classic game (apart from > > Ahl's Basic version.) > > I have it on an original DECUS papertape, IIRC > (http://archive.netbsd.se/?ml=cctalk&a=2004-01&m=144185 - yep... there > I am talking about it ;-) Then we just have to twist your arm to upload it somewhere :-). > You might be after DECUS tape FOCAL8-5 - "The Sumer Game" > > The writeup is: > > DECUS NO. FOCAL8-5 > > The Sumer Game > > Doug Dyment, Digital Equipment of Canada, Ltd., Carleton Place, Canada > > This is a simulation program/game which will run on a minimal PDP-8 > system. The economy of a Sumerian city in the year 3000 B. C. is > simulated in the fashion of a modern-day "business game." You seem to imply that this *isn't* what you have the tape for? Has anyone written Doug and asked him? (He's not hard to find online.) > I tried googling for DECUS papertapes online, but did not find > anything with a casual search. The Wikipedia entry does echo the > credits for the original version to Doug Dyment > (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamurabi), but doesn't have a link to > FOCAL code. > > Perhaps someone on the list has a tar file full of digitized DECUS > papertapes? Now that would be something. I've never found any trace of most of the DECUS stuff for the PDP-8, except the text blurbs like the one quoted above. Vince From marvin at west.net Tue Mar 30 09:57:03 2010 From: marvin at west.net (Marvin Johnston) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 07:57:03 -0700 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies Message-ID: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> I just finished a project using stepper motors and a PIC processor to drive the whole thing. Aside from defining the parameters (and debugging my mistakes), it was pretty easy to do. I used a Ramsey Stepper Motor driver kit to drive a 200 step/rev floppy disk drive motor along with a 16F84A PIC processor to control it, and it worked great. Using a sharpie to just mark the hole location sounds like it would be really easy to do. Anyone know the permissible hole tolerances on hard sector floppies? If using a laser, what power would be required to cut the holes and what kind of laser? I currently have a 35W IR laser that could be more than a bit dangerous without proper safety precautions ... I've kind of gotten used to eyesight :)! >> People have been known to make their own 5 1/4" hard-sectored disks. I don't >> > remember the details, but the basic idea was to take a 5 1/4" disk drive to >> > hold the disk, make an index wheel for the holes, add a hole punch, and then >> > just add time. > > One thought I had was to take an old 5.25" floppy frame (say an > SA400), replace the DC motor with a stepper, mount a floppy disc, then > drive the rotation so many steps (you'd have to calculate/measure the > pulley ratio), then punch the media. Simple stepper drivers are > inexpensive to buy ($20, say) or make and easy to drive from a > microcontroller or parallel port (or even 555, if you wanted to do it > "old school"). It'd be even "better" to have a laser make the hole, > but that's a lot of power to be squirting around - punches for mylar > rarely make holes in someone's retina. > > If it's too tricky to mount the punch or die in the floppy frame, one > could pulse the media around as required and dot the spot with a > sharpie, then eject the floppy and punch the holes by hand. > > -ethan From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 30 10:10:39 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 11:10:39 -0400 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> Message-ID: <2A4CD9A6-0CD2-4A3B-9038-08B7113E2307@neurotica.com> On Mar 30, 2010, at 10:57 AM, Marvin Johnston wrote: > I just finished a project using stepper motors and a PIC processor > to drive the whole thing. Aside from defining the parameters (and > debugging my mistakes), it was pretty easy to do. I used a Ramsey > Stepper Motor driver kit to drive a 200 step/rev floppy disk drive > motor along with a 16F84A PIC processor to control it, and it > worked great. Wow...PHOTOS!!! > If using a laser, what power would be required to cut the holes and > what kind of laser? I currently have a 35W IR laser that could be > more than a bit dangerous without proper safety precautions ... > I've kind of gotten used to eyesight :)! This is a VERY interesting idea. It depends on the spectral absorption characteristics of the media, but as an offhand guess, I'd say 150mW ought to do it. One of the BluRay laser diodes that are readily available on eBay should be just fine, something like the common PHR-803T. That does 100mW+ at 405nm. Since the material you're drilling is so thin, you don't need a cylindrical beam, which simplifies the optics by quite a bit. A simple focusing lens should be fine. The only tough part is driving the laser diode, which is only tough if you haven't handled them before. Laser diodes like this will burn out if you look at them crooked. Building a proper power supply isn't hard or expensive, though. I encourage you to investigate the possibility of a laser-based automatic punching system for this. If you want, you may subscribe to the lasers list that I run; there's lots of help available there. There are some serious heavy-hitters on that mailing list, including Winfield Hill (yes, THAT Winfield Hill) and Jon Singer (who has lased just about everything). -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From dkelvey at hotmail.com Tue Mar 30 10:24:29 2010 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 08:24:29 -0700 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> Message-ID: Hi A laser is a little high tech but I just made a punch with a drill bit ( #93 as I recall ). I use the same drill to drill the holes in the punch blocks that I mounted to the drive. If you insist on using a laser, you need to make a circular cut. This can be easily done by a slight off center focus with the lens. Mount it so that it is in a rotating mount and slightly eccentric. I found that placement of the holes needs to be quite close. With my indexed flywheel, I'm placeing them within about .001 to .003 inch someplace. I did find that the H89 is fussy about the index hole relative to the sector holes. After punching your holds, put a scope on the index output of the drive. It is quite clear then how well you placed the holes. Dwight > Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 07:57:03 -0700 > From: marvin at west.net > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies > > > I just finished a project using stepper motors and a PIC processor to > drive the whole thing. Aside from defining the parameters (and debugging > my mistakes), it was pretty easy to do. I used a Ramsey Stepper Motor > driver kit to drive a 200 step/rev floppy disk drive motor along with a > 16F84A PIC processor to control it, and it worked great. > > Using a sharpie to just mark the hole location sounds like it would be > really easy to do. Anyone know the permissible hole tolerances on hard > sector floppies? > > If using a laser, what power would be required to cut the holes and what > kind of laser? I currently have a 35W IR laser that could be more than a > bit dangerous without proper safety precautions ... I've kind of gotten > used to eyesight :)! > > > > >> People have been known to make their own 5 1/4" hard-sectored disks. I don't > >> > remember the details, but the basic idea was to take a 5 1/4" disk drive to > >> > hold the disk, make an index wheel for the holes, add a hole punch, and then > >> > just add time. > > > > One thought I had was to take an old 5.25" floppy frame (say an > > SA400), replace the DC motor with a stepper, mount a floppy disc, then > > drive the rotation so many steps (you'd have to calculate/measure the > > pulley ratio), then punch the media. Simple stepper drivers are > > inexpensive to buy ($20, say) or make and easy to drive from a > > microcontroller or parallel port (or even 555, if you wanted to do it > > "old school"). It'd be even "better" to have a laser make the hole, > > but that's a lot of power to be squirting around - punches for mylar > > rarely make holes in someone's retina. > > > > If it's too tricky to mount the punch or die in the floppy frame, one > > could pulse the media around as required and dot the spot with a > > sharpie, then eject the floppy and punch the holes by hand. > > > > -ethan > _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Trusted email with Microsoft?s powerful SPAM protection. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/210850552/direct/01/ From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Mar 30 10:28:10 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 11:28:10 -0400 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> Message-ID: On 3/30/10, Marvin Johnston wrote: > > I just finished a project using stepper motors and a PIC processor to > drive the whole thing. Aside from defining the parameters (and debugging > my mistakes), it was pretty easy to do. I used a Ramsey Stepper Motor > driver kit to drive a 200 step/rev floppy disk drive motor along with a > 16F84A PIC processor to control it, and it worked great. Nice. > Using a sharpie to just mark the hole location sounds like it would be > really easy to do. Anyone know the permissible hole tolerances on hard > sector floppies? Can't help you there. > If using a laser, what power would be required to cut the holes and what > kind of laser? I currently have a 35W IR laser that could be more than a > bit dangerous without proper safety precautions ... I've kind of gotten > used to eyesight :)! Wow! 35W? That will cut through 6mm acrylic with the right optics, I'm pretty sure (50W will cut through 12mm). I don't know what the threshold is for punching through mylar (vs acrylic), but 35W seems like more than enough. A solid wood box for a cover would be a good idea to protect your eyesight. -etthan From dkelvey at hotmail.com Tue Mar 30 11:12:02 2010 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 09:12:02 -0700 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net>, Message-ID: > Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 11:28:10 -0400 > Subject: Re: Making Hard Sector Floppies > From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > > On 3/30/10, Marvin Johnston wrote: > > > > I just finished a project using stepper motors and a PIC processor to > > drive the whole thing. Aside from defining the parameters (and debugging > > my mistakes), it was pretty easy to do. I used a Ramsey Stepper Motor > > driver kit to drive a 200 step/rev floppy disk drive motor along with a > > 16F84A PIC processor to control it, and it worked great. > > Nice. > > > Using a sharpie to just mark the hole location sounds like it would be > > really easy to do. Anyone know the permissible hole tolerances on hard > > sector floppies? > > Can't help you there. > > > If using a laser, what power would be required to cut the holes and what > > kind of laser? I currently have a 35W IR laser that could be more than a > > bit dangerous without proper safety precautions ... I've kind of gotten > > used to eyesight :)! > > Wow! 35W? That will cut through 6mm acrylic with the right optics, > I'm pretty sure (50W will cut through 12mm). I don't know what the > threshold is for punching through mylar (vs acrylic), but 35W seems > like more than enough. A solid wood box for a cover would be a good > idea to protect your eyesight. > > -etthan A 35W is more than enough. Do remember, you want to vaporize and not just melt. This does require focusing. IR is a pain to focus. Two options; one is germanium lenses ( $$$$ ) and the other is gold first surface mirrors ( $ ). As I mentioned before, it is best to make it cut a circle with the beam. If using mirrors, use elliptical mirrors for best results since you need to create a small spot. It is best to use a longish focal length, say about 2 foot or so. This allows you to keep the mirror a reasonable distance from the disk ( at least 6 inches ). Spatter from the disk is a pain. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail has tools for the New Busy. Search, chat and e-mail from your inbox. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:WL:en-US:WM_HMP:032010_1 From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 30 11:12:32 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:12:32 -0400 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> Message-ID: <391019E3-1D7E-49FC-B662-E0BE55C5A1D6@neurotica.com> On Mar 30, 2010, at 11:28 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote: > Wow! 35W? That will cut through 6mm acrylic with the right optics, > I'm pretty sure (50W will cut through 12mm). I don't know what the > threshold is for punching through mylar (vs acrylic), but 35W seems > like more than enough. Uhh yeah, like by a factor of 100 or more. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Mar 30 11:18:51 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:18:51 -0400 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net>, Message-ID: <0C8F1144-83F3-4CF9-9715-768DAE11A367@neurotica.com> On Mar 30, 2010, at 12:12 PM, dwight elvey wrote: > A 35W is more than enough. Do remember, you want to vaporize and > not just melt. This does require focusing. IR is a pain to focus. > Two options; one is germanium lenses ( $$$$ ) and the other is gold > first surface mirrors ( $ ). Why use IR? Visible (either native or frequency-multiplied) lasers are readily and cheaply available in the required power range nowadays. I have a few of them sitting on my desk. Very friendly optics-wise. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 30 11:52:31 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 09:52:31 -0700 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net>, Message-ID: <4BB1C9DF.28584.126DC6@cclist.sydex.com> On 30 Mar 2010 at 8:24, dwight elvey wrote: > A laser is a little high tech but I just made a punch > with a drill bit ( #93 as I recall ). I use the same > drill to drill the holes in the punch blocks that I mounted > to the drive. At this point, instead of all of the high-tech electronics, I'd probably just opt for a punch that would punch the naked cookie with all holes at once. It's usually easy enough to remove the cookie from the jacket and replace it. You could enlist the aid of the local university who usually has tooling wandering around that would make one drool. Then make up a bunch of floppies and flog them for $2 each on the vintage forums. ...or you could just order a batch from Athana... Best regards, Chuck From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Tue Mar 30 13:53:35 2010 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 19:53:35 +0100 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom References: Message-ID: <00bd01cad03d$b7ed86e0$032c5b0a@user8459cef6fa> ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Roger Holmes" > To: > Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2010 2:56 PM > Subject: Re: Using vintage computers in the classroom > > I can't describe the reactions of those who visit my classic car show and then walk into a > barn and find a five ton 1962 mainframe working away twirling tapes, reading and > punching 80 column cards, reading and punching paper tape whilst making ghostly > noises through its built in speaker. Sounds like the closest you'd get to being in the Jupiter 2 (Lost In Space) with some aliens! > I should maybe give them ear defenders because its so > noisy and I haven't even displayed the 600 line per minute printer working yet until I fix > it. The heat and smell of hot electronics is a bit overpowering too. I have never worked > out where the smell comes from, is it gas escaping from the components, the paxolin or > the solder/flux. I think hot metal gives off a distinctive smell, but why I don't know. > I know a lot comes from the magnetic tapes, we had a walk in safe full of > tape where I worked once and when it was opened after a month or two locked up it made > a hell of a stink, like Tutenkamen's tomb. > I don't know what Tutenkamen's tomb smells like, but certainly video tape (as in VHS tape) does give off a unique smell when warm. I used to take out the videocassette after watching something, turn it upsidedown and give it a sniff (no, I don't know why I started doing that!). I started doing that quite a bit (not sure whether it was habit or addiction!) for a while, but eventually stopped. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uki From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Tue Mar 30 14:33:27 2010 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:33:27 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: <00bd01cad03d$b7ed86e0$032c5b0a@user8459cef6fa> References: <00bd01cad03d$b7ed86e0$032c5b0a@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: On Tue, 30 Mar 2010, Andrew Burton wrote: > I don't know what Tutenkamen's tomb smells like, but certainly video tape > (as in VHS tape) does give off a unique smell when warm. I used to take out > the videocassette after watching something, turn it upsidedown and give it a > sniff (no, I don't know why I started doing that!). I started doing that > quite a bit (not sure whether it was habit or addiction!) for a while, but > eventually stopped. Videocassette drawers always smell like cough syrup to me. -- 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 pontus at Update.UU.SE Tue Mar 30 14:55:55 2010 From: pontus at Update.UU.SE (Pontus Pihlgren) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 21:55:55 +0200 Subject: DECTalk DTC01 In-Reply-To: <4BB202B5.8060806@softjar.se> References: <4BB202B5.8060806@softjar.se> Message-ID: <20100330195555.GA29521@Update.UU.SE> > As far as I know, there was never a Unibus version of DECtalk. The > DTC01 was connected via a normal serial port, and could be used on > any machine. So DEC didn't really have a need to have a bus based > card developed (they did later, though.) Of course I meant to say QBUS: "M7132 DTC04 Q DECVoice main processor board (dual height)" > (Btw, Stephen Hawkings used a DECtalk for many many years... :-) ) Which sparked my interest of course, his voice has become a celebrity in itself. > A pretty good list with some small information is > http://www3.sympatico.ca/n.rieck/docs/openvms_notes_DECtalk.html Thanks, Pontus. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 30 14:23:19 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 20:23:19 +0100 (BST) Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom In-Reply-To: from "Ethan Dicks" at Mar 29, 10 03:52:24 pm Message-ID: > > On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 3:25 PM, Ian King wrote: > > We're still in our first steps, and haven't made a lot of use of vintage systems in the classroom (although I do like to bring along my PDP-8/f, just to demonstrate what a desktop computer looked like in 1970). > > If you have a moving van, you could bring a DataSystem 310 (PDP-8/a > w/RX02) to show that in 1978, a desktop computer was so-called because > it came with its own desk. ;-) Hmmm. I would argue the HP Model 30 Calculator (aka HP9830) from 1973 is a desktop computer. Or at least I'd love to see a sensible definition of 'desktop computer' that excludes it. That machine is portable in the sense 1 person can easily carry it (HP even sold an optional carrying handle..). I've carreid mine into buildings to give talks/demonstrations of it. > > The Straight-8, the -8/S, the -8/L and the -8/e all had "desktop" > configurations as well as rackable configurations (i.e. - factory-made > desktop covers (black metal except for the Straight-8, which was > smoked plexi), but I think the other models of PDP-8 only had rackable > packages (not that you couldn't leave a PDP-8 out on a desk, but in I have. On the deks alongside me is a PDP8/e, a TU56 and sittiog on top of the TU56 is a PC04. > terms of aesthetics, vents, mounting ears, etc., they weren't "desk > pretty"). Indeed. Philips mdea portable version of the P850 minicomputer. It was a standard P850 chassis in a plastic casing.I suspect it took 2 people to move it sensibly. I have never seen it, only pictures. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 30 14:25:45 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 20:25:45 +0100 (BST) Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: from "Ethan Dicks" at Mar 29, 10 04:26:27 pm Message-ID: > Perhaps someone on the list has a tar file full of digitized DECUS papertap= > es? What the heck is a digitised paper tape? Paper tape is digital anyway. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Mar 30 15:01:54 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 21:01:54 +0100 (BST) Subject: Siemens 'Pocket Reader' Message-ID: I've obtained Sioemens 'Pocket Reader' (called a 'Reading Pen' in the luser manual). This is a handheld 1-line scanner/OCR device. It's very modern for me (the manual is copyright 1998) but I guess it's on-topic here now. And it was cheap enough in a local charity shop... It came with a cable to link it to a PC (3 conductor 2.5mm jack (phone) plug at one end, DE9 socket at the other, the latter connects to a PC serial port) and a disk of software alas for Windows... Anyway, I have of course taken the thing apart. If yoy have one and want to do this, you stat by ignoring all the safety warnings in the manual (to be honest, there is no way this thing is goign to harm oyu unless you try to swallow it!). Take off the battery cover and remove the batteries, then undo the 4 TX6 screws on that side. Turn it over and lift off the top case (the buttons are captive in the top case). Unplug the display modeul (a stnadard 14-pin LCD text display I believe), then lift out th roller assembly (this operates the mirocswithc when you press the 'pen' down to scan a line of text and has the interrupter wheel to detect motion along the paper). Unplug the read head (CCD and LEDs) from the front edge of the main PCB. Free the batteryt contacts and lift the PCB out. My first real suprsie is that I expected this thing to be based on an ASIC, probabbly driect-on-board and expoxy capped. It isn't. It's all SMD chips with numbers I recgnise. The smarts is an ADSP2816 DSP chip, together with 1M*16 bits of mask ROM and a 29F040 flash ROM (to store the scanned text I assume). A few TTL parts, a DC-DC comverter, a compartor chip and an ERS232 buffer. Nothing really odd. Anyway, the problem is that the software is for an OS I don't have or wich to run. The manual doesn't give the seiral protocol (or even the baud rate), does anyone know of a description of it, or any open-source software that talks to this device? -tony From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 30 15:07:43 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 13:07:43 -0700 Subject: OT: 32 vs. 8-bit MCUs In-Reply-To: <00bd01cad03d$b7ed86e0$032c5b0a@user8459cef6fa> References: , <00bd01cad03d$b7ed86e0$032c5b0a@user8459cef6fa> Message-ID: <4BB1F79F.11266.C52481@cclist.sydex.com> A short time ago (a week or two), the discussion of uCs came up and I pointed out that the Cortex M0 architecture had a good possibility to displace the traditional 8-bit uCs, such as the 8051, AVR and PIC. In my email today, I received this code-density study paper. Granted, it's by a guy from NXP, with an ARM axe to grind, but for whatever it's worth: http://www.embeddeddeveloper.com/corp/flex/CodeDensity-NXP_IQ-30.pdf This does remind me of an experience I had with the then-new x86 architecture. The local sales guy was pushing really hard for the x86 to be the replacement for our 8085-based systems, pointing out that x86 code was far more efficient space-wise than x80 code and that translation tools were available to make the switchover easy. I gave in and cooked up a code sample that used our floating-point package to compute pi--a verifiable result. The FP code had the dickens optimized out of it because it was high-use as part of a BASIC runtime, so I thought it was a good candidate and at about 3000 lines, was non-trivial. There was an MDS all set up at the sales office and I sumitted my code on an 8" ISIS-II floppy for processing right after lunch. With a wink, the sales engineer said "Oh, this should be easy--there's no I/O". He cranked the translator up and we retreated to the conference room for coffee. Well, coffee turned into a free dinner and at 8 PM, the translator was still grinding away. It never did finish, so I went home and left the code with the sales guy. About three weeks later, he called to say that they'd found the bug in the translator and that my code was ready to test. I was a bit surprised to see that it was almost two and a half times larger than the original version. Worse, it didn't assemble--there were errors. And when those were finally fixed, it didn't give a correct answer--or any answer, for that matter. It simply died. With a wave of his hand, the sales guy said that some "hand tweaking" might be necessary. I responded that I might as well recode the whole thing if I was going to have to debug it as working with automatically generated translator code was not my idea of fun. Thus, I take the NXP guy's claim with a small mountain of salt--but it makes for interesting reading. Best regards, Chuck From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Mar 30 16:27:20 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 17:27:20 -0400 Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 3/30/10, Tony Duell wrote: >> Perhaps someone on the list has a tar file full of digitized DECUS >> papertapes? > > What the heck is a digitised paper tape? Paper tape is digital anyway. Poor choice of words on my part. How about "perhaps someone on the list has a tar file full of byte streams originally published on DECUS papertapes?" -ethan From pat at computer-refuge.org Tue Mar 30 16:33:25 2010 From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 17:33:25 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news =?iso-8859-1?q?=09update?=) In-Reply-To: References: <25D81406-4F6F-4D0A-B19E-0CE5A5352FDF@gmail.com> Message-ID: <201003301733.25615.pat@computer-refuge.org> On Wednesday 24 March 2010, Ian King wrote: > VAX-11/780-5, 24x7 Ok, this bothers me. Why is it an "11/780-5" not an "11/785" like everyone else in the world seems to call them? Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Mar 30 16:39:31 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 17:39:31 -0400 Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: References: <496c74471003281329r42e4111aw94d253980dbdcfde@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 3/30/10, Vincent Slyngstad wrote: > From: "Ethan Dicks" Monday, March 29, 2010 1:26 PM >> I have it on an original DECUS papertape, IIRC >> (http://archive.netbsd.se/?ml=cctalk&a=2004-01&m=144185 - yep... there >> I am talking about it ;-) > > Then we just have to twist your arm to upload it somewhere :-). I might just have to do that. I have several ways to read papertapes directly into pre-Omnibus PDP-8s, but I'd have to think a bit on the best way to attach something to a "modern machine" to read tapes for uploading. I have an RS-232<->20mA adapter lying around, but no docs and I haven't yet reverse-engineered the schematic to ensure it's using the alternate EIA pins for current loop. That's one option. I'm sure I have an IBM 5150 or 5160 with an original serial card (that could support current loop), but it'd be at the bottom of a stack in storage. Building a current loop adapter from scratch might be the fastest path. I have an ASR33 and a DEC PRS/04 reader (both current loop, one 110 bps, one faster, IIRC). >> You might be after DECUS tape FOCAL8-5 - "The Sumer Game" > > You seem to imply that this *isn't* what you have the tape for? I'm implying that I don't know for certain that the tape I have is that exact tape. I have *a* tape. I haven't looked at it this year, so I'm allowing for fuzzy memory. I might have a tape containing a later version of the program, if there happened to ever be one. > Has anyone written Doug and asked him? (He's not hard to find online.) I have not. I just did a few minutes digging (beyond a one-line drive-by googling) to help the original questor. Doug would be an authoritative source, but in case he doesn't have a 40+-year-old program lying around in easy-to-access machine readable form, one could pursue the DECUS route as well. > Now that would be something. I've never found any trace of most of > the DECUS stuff for the PDP-8, except the text blurbs like the one > quoted above. I don't have all that much of the older stuff myself - perhaps a handful of papertapes (less than 10) and perhaps a floppy or two. My only exposure to the vast majority of those programs is those same blurbs that are already well circulated. -ethan From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Tue Mar 30 17:12:09 2010 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 23:12:09 +0100 Subject: Siemens 'Pocket Reader' In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BB27739.8090006@philpem.me.uk> Tony Duell wrote: > Anyway, the problem is that the software is for an OS I don't have or > wich to run. The manual doesn't give the seiral protocol (or even the > baud rate), does anyone know of a description of it, or any open-source > software that talks to this device? One of the guys behind the PReader did an "unofficial home page" for it: http://free.pages.at/pocketreader/ At one point he was giving out the programming specification... problem is, it's in German. I did translate it to English, but can't find the DOC file anywhere. I bet it's on a backup disc somewhere, I just don't know which one. Joerg Schuler did an open-source PReader driver for Linux -- it's on the above website. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From IanK at vulcan.com Tue Mar 30 17:33:32 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 15:33:32 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... In-Reply-To: <201003301733.25615.pat@computer-refuge.org> References: <25D81406-4F6F-4D0A-B19E-0CE5A5352FDF@gmail.com> <201003301733.25615.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Patrick Finnegan > Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2010 2:33 PM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news > update) > > On Wednesday 24 March 2010, Ian King wrote: > > VAX-11/780-5, 24x7 > > Ok, this bothers me. Why is it an "11/780-5" not an "11/785" like > everyone else in the world seems to call them? > That what it says on the front of the machine. :-) This machine was apparently upgraded in the field. This was a common DEC practice for many years, and part of the package was new livery for the machine. The machine sitting next to it is badged "11/785", and all evidence is that it was shipped as such, i.e. with the KA785 CPU. -- Ian From wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Mar 30 17:45:39 2010 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 18:45:39 -0400 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: <201003301733.25615.pat@computer-refuge.org> References: <25D81406-4F6F-4D0A-B19E-0CE5A5352FDF@gmail.com> <201003301733.25615.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: > Ok, this bothers me. ?Why is it an "11/780-5" not an "11/785" like > everyone else in the world seems to call them? > > Pat > -- > Purdue University Research Computing --- ?http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ Probably the same bunch that call those big CDC supercomputers "Cyber 200 Model 205" instead of "Cyber 205" like everyone else in the world seems to call them. -- Will From IanK at vulcan.com Tue Mar 30 18:01:41 2010 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 16:01:41 -0700 Subject: Speaking of paper tape.... Message-ID: Does anyone out there have some or all of the "Paper Tape System" tapes for the PDP-11/20? We have a couple of 11/20s with the basic 4kW installed, and I'd like to set up a machine to demonstrate the life of a paper-tape-based programmer. I'd be glad to cover your expenses for a copy or, if it's more convenient, pay shipping for you to loan them to us and we would make the copies. Or, if someone is aware of where images of these live that I haven't been able to uncover, I'd be grateful for a pointer. Please feel free to contact me privately. Thanks! -- Ian UNIX is user friendly. It's just selective about who its friends are. Ian S. King, Sr. Vintage Systems Engineer Living Computer Museum A project of Vulcan, Inc. http://www.livingcomputermuseum.org From cclist at sydex.com Tue Mar 30 18:13:35 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 16:13:35 -0700 Subject: Leaving computers on... (was Re: Disc analyser news update) In-Reply-To: References: <25D81406-4F6F-4D0A-B19E-0CE5A5352FDF@gmail.com>, <201003301733.25615.pat@computer-refuge.org>, Message-ID: <4BB2232F.9025.16F50E5@cclist.sydex.com> On 30 Mar 2010 at 18:45, William Donzelli wrote: > Probably the same bunch that call those big CDC supercomputers "Cyber > 200 Model 205" instead of "Cyber 205" like everyone else in the world > seems to call them. Funny--I used to call them "STAR 205s". I guess you had to be there. --Chuck From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Mar 30 22:06:44 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 21:06:44 -0600 Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BB2BC44.7000204@jetnet.ab.ca> Tony Duell wrote: >> Perhaps someone on the list has a tar file full of digitized DECUS papertap= >> es? > > What the heck is a digitised paper tape? Paper tape is digital anyway. Scanned paper tape, comes to mind. Pick up '"Unearthing the PDP-15 Operating Systems", by Bob Supnik' from the simh site. > -tony > I still consider paper tape to be more analog, so I suspect digitized paper tape is the tape processed some way into a file. Ben. From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Mar 30 22:31:43 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 20:31:43 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: <4BB2BC44.7000204@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4BB2BC44.7000204@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <20100330202840.M84079@shell.lmi.net> > I still consider paper tape to be more analog, so I suspect digitized > paper tape is the tape processed some way into a file. Once you get it digitized, would you mind if we suggested storing that file on paper tape? From derschjo at mail.msu.edu Tue Mar 30 22:57:11 2010 From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 20:57:11 -0700 Subject: Northstar Horizon boot disks In-Reply-To: References: <12A20EC40EF5@dunfield.com> <4BB10539.6070703@mail.msu.edu> Message-ID: <4BB2C817.2050206@mail.msu.edu> Excellent :). Contact me offlist and we can work something out... Thanks, Josh Dave McGuire wrote: > On Mar 29, 2010, at 3:53 PM, Josh Dersch wrote: >> Cool. I actually have a few 2708s lying around but I don't think my >> programmer will write them (I think 2716s are the lower limit). >> Ironically, I have a Piiceon "8K program saver" that will (assuming >> it's working and I can find documentation) do the job but of course I >> don't have a working S100 machine to use it in :). >> >> So I now have a second request: Can anyone program a 2708 (or two) >> for me, assuming I supply the chips? (I'd just adapt a 2716, but I >> don't have any...) > > I can program 2708s, and I need to ship you a box soon anyway. > > -Dave > From rdbrown at pacific.net.au Tue Mar 30 08:41:44 2010 From: rdbrown at pacific.net.au (Rodney Brown) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 00:41:44 +1100 Subject: Pre-1980 DEC Technical Reports/Memoranda? Message-ID: <1269956504.3084.54.camel@localhost.localdomain> Where would DEC Technical Reports prior to 1980 would be found - on the web? The following reference is one I've never sighted, thought it was referenced (as unsighted in Ross William's 1993 Painless guide to CRC posting). Wecker, S (1974). "A Table-Lookup Algorithm for Software Computation of Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC)". Digital Equipment Corporation memorandum. or Wecker, S., "A Table-Lookup Algorithm for Software Computation of Cyclic Redundancy Check," Technical Note, Digital Equipment Corporation, January 1974. HP has "heritage" DEC/Compaq Technical Reports 1981-2002 at http://www.hpl.hp.com/techreports/Compaq-DEC/ but not earlier ones it seems. Google books and scholar show references to the paper, other papers and a book by Stuart Wecker in the 1970-80 period, but don't seem to give links to DEC Technical reports or memoranda prior to 1980. Google groups showed some people reminiscing about using the Stuart Weckers algorithm in comp.lang.lisp. I didn't see anything relevant in WorldCat or searching the Computer History Museum collection, nor from a quick glance at BitSavers. Suggestions or just ask HP? From bqt at softjar.se Tue Mar 30 08:55:01 2010 From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 15:55:01 +0200 Subject: DECTalk DTC01 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BB202B5.8060806@softjar.se> Pontus Pihlgren wrote: > Hi All. > > I've become curious about the different DECTalk devices. There seems to > have been a number of variants. The stand alone DTC01, a UNIBUS version > and a PCI card version (DTC07). > > Do all these sound the same? Or are newer ones more advanced? > > The number (07) on the PCI version indicate that there has been at least > seven versions, what are the others? > > And finally, does anyone have system over and would consider selling it? > (DTC01 seems to be the simplest and is thus preferred) As far as I know, there was never a Unibus version of DECtalk. The DTC01 was connected via a normal serial port, and could be used on any machine. So DEC didn't really have a need to have a bus based card developed (they did later, though.) I played with one way back when I was working at DEC, around 1986. It was fun, and you could make it do a lot (including sing). Quite impressive for its day, and I'd say it is still definitely usable even today. I've heard some better, but there are current products out there which are worse than DECtalk was 25 years ago... (Btw, Stephen Hawkings used a DECtalk for many many years... :-) ) A pretty good list with some small information is http://www3.sympatico.ca/n.rieck/docs/openvms_notes_DECtalk.html I don't know if a DTC02 ever existed, or what it might have been. Johnny From chrise at pobox.com Tue Mar 30 09:31:49 2010 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 09:31:49 -0500 Subject: SS50 to Exorbus adapter found Message-ID: <20100330143149.GM24331@n0jcf.net> I was going through some boxes of parts for my SWTPC 6800 collection and I found an unpopulated PCB with SWTPC logo on it and date 1978 which appears to be an SS50 to Motorola Exorbus adapter. It has SS50 connectors on the bottom edge and the 43/86-pin Exorbus connector footprint on the top edge. Looks like locations for two DIPs, one 20-pin and one 8-pin, a voltage regulator and a few passives. The board is 8" wide by 2" high. I have no idea where this came from or why I have it. Does anyone know what it might be for? ie, does it adapt an Exorbus memory or peripheral to SS50 bus or does it adapt an Exorbus CPU to SS50?? I can send photos of the board to anyone that is interested. It appears to be an authentic SWTPC design/product rather than someone's homebrew project or a third party product. So, I am interested in learning more about it. Chris -- Chris Elmquist From mark.kahrs at gmail.com Tue Mar 30 10:26:31 2010 From: mark.kahrs at gmail.com (Mark Kahrs) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 11:26:31 -0400 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom Message-ID: <67abbca31003300826x2b5c7521w4752d0b293320439@mail.gmail.com> The last time I taught assembly language programming, I decided to include the PDP-11 as an example of addressing modes. This is because Patterson and Hennesey just use MIPS --- it's a good pedagogical method but then when the students hit the real world they wouldn't know an address mode from ??? I also had them think about the VT-40 as an example --- I thought they would like that kind of graphical machine (I was wrong of course). If I was more prepared and had a full graphical simulator, that would have helped. From ygehrich at yahoo.com Tue Mar 30 11:01:42 2010 From: ygehrich at yahoo.com (Gene Ehrich) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:01:42 -0400 Subject: Very Old IBM software Message-ID: <41951.58515.qm@smtp108.prem.mail.sp1.yahoo.com> I have a bunch of very old IBM software in original boxes that I would like to find a home for. I hate to throw them way when I know there must be those who would love to acquire them. $5 each + shipping. Contact me at ygehrich at yahoo.com. Ami Pro, Writing Assistant, Professional Write, Professional File, Professional Plan, QA3, Word Perfect and more From chrise at pobox.com Tue Mar 30 20:25:39 2010 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 20:25:39 -0500 Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: References: <496c74471003281329r42e4111aw94d253980dbdcfde@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20100331012539.GK5528@n0jcf.net> On Tuesday (03/30/2010 at 05:39PM -0400), Ethan Dicks wrote: > On 3/30/10, Vincent Slyngstad wrote: > > From: "Ethan Dicks" Monday, March 29, 2010 1:26 PM > >> I have it on an original DECUS papertape, IIRC > >> (http://archive.netbsd.se/?ml=cctalk&a=2004-01&m=144185 - yep... there > >> I am talking about it ;-) > > > > Then we just have to twist your arm to upload it somewhere :-). > > I might just have to do that. I have several ways to read papertapes > directly into pre-Omnibus PDP-8s, but I'd have to think a bit on the > best way to attach something to a "modern machine" to read tapes for > uploading. If you get stuck, I can sure help. I recently restored an HP 2748B optical reader (500 CPS) and built an RS232 interface for it so that I can read tapes into a Linux machine... and do it quickly. It's optical and uses only a pinch roller to grab the tape so should be minimally "damaging" to the tapes. I did this so that I could preserve hundreds of tapes I have for an Altair 680b. Chris -- Chris Elmquist From quapla at xs4all.nl Wed Mar 31 01:19:17 2010 From: quapla at xs4all.nl (E. Groenenberg) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 08:19:17 +0200 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: <2A4CD9A6-0CD2-4A3B-9038-08B7113E2307@neurotica.com> References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> <2A4CD9A6-0CD2-4A3B-9038-08B7113E2307@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> ====snip snip snip ==== >> If using a laser, what power would be required to cut the holes and >> what kind of laser? I currently have a 35W IR laser that could be >> more than a bit dangerous without proper safety precautions ... >> I've kind of gotten used to eyesight :)! > ===== snip snip snip ==== Aaarggghhh! A laser and a vintage computer(part)? Next stop a paperpuncher with a laser to cut the holes??? But interesting idea to use a laser to cut the holes in the floppy surface. Ed -- Dit is een HTML vrije email / This is an HTML free email. From dseagrav at lunar-tokyo.net Wed Mar 31 07:09:03 2010 From: dseagrav at lunar-tokyo.net (Daniel Seagraves) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 07:09:03 -0500 Subject: Speaking of paper tape.... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <765887C0-A8C8-4EEE-8DCF-946A2B65F882@lunar-tokyo.net> I have a few boxes of paper tapes for the 11. I'll have to see if they are what you are looking for. Do you know what id numbers would be on the ones you want? On Mar 30, 2010, at 6:01 PM, Ian King wrote: > Does anyone out there have some or all of the "Paper Tape System" > tapes for the PDP-11/20? We have a couple of 11/20s with the basic > 4kW installed, and I'd like to set up a machine to demonstrate the > life of a paper-tape-based programmer. I'd be glad to cover your > expenses for a copy or, if it's more convenient, pay shipping for > you to loan them to us and we would make the copies. Or, if someone > is aware of where images of these live that I haven't been able to > uncover, I'd be grateful for a pointer. > > Please feel free to contact me privately. Thanks! -- Ian > > > UNIX is user friendly. It's just selective about who its friends are. > Ian S. King, Sr. Vintage Systems Engineer > Living Computer Museum > A project of Vulcan, Inc. > http://www.livingcomputermuseum.org > > > > From billdeg at degnanco.com Wed Mar 31 07:48:04 2010 From: billdeg at degnanco.com (Bill Degnan) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 08:48:04 -0400 Subject: Using vintage computers in the classroom - Practical stuff Message-ID: <44d0767b$3cbb42f3$358257e$@com> I have been teaching computer history at the U of Delaware for my 4th semester, and there are a few practical items worth mentioning in this discussion. I bring a (usually) working computer or device that I use for demonstration purposes for each class. I only bring what I can fit in my trunk, and carry on a collapse-able dolly. My classes are one hour and 15 minutes, there is not much time to set up and then vacate the room for the next lecturer. It is therefore very important that I practice staging the system before clas, and also carefully correograph the presentation in a way that incorporates the equipment in a meaningful way, beyond the ooo aaa factor. It is important to have a specific, targeted point to demonstrate. Use a laptop whenver you need a terminal , so that you can pipe the output onto the overhead projecting device. Sometimes I pick a student to start entering data (ie. toggle switches/BASIC code, etc) in the beginning of the class so that by the time we need the system it is ready for the demonstration. It is also kind of like a cooking show; you bring two of something, one that is "pre-finished" and other that is used for the demo so that you can show the end result of a long process within a limited time frame. One last thing, it is a courtesy when you're running something loud like a teletype to ask the professor in the next class if the noise will disturb the lecture! It's like a mini vintage computer festival every class, sometimes I wish I taught US History Bill Degnan From geneb at deltasoft.com Wed Mar 31 08:20:03 2010 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 06:20:03 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> <2A4CD9A6-0CD2-4A3B-9038-08B7113E2307@neurotica.com> <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> Message-ID: > ====snip snip snip ==== >>> If using a laser, what power would be required to cut the holes and >>> what kind of laser? I currently have a 35W IR laser that could be >>> more than a bit dangerous without proper safety precautions ... >>> I've kind of gotten used to eyesight :)! >> > ===== snip snip snip ==== > > Aaarggghhh! A laser and a vintage computer(part)? > > Next stop a paperpuncher with a laser to cut the holes??? > > But interesting idea to use a laser to cut the holes in the floppy surface. > If someone were to make a CAD drawing of the cookie with the sector holes cut-out, it would be trivial to make the sector holes on my Epilog Mini-24. To make it even crazier, I could create a custom jig on my 'bot that would use a tiny pin to engage the index hole on the cookie, with venting underneath the sector hole area (needed when laser cutting). It would take probably 10 seconds a disc. It might even be possible to stack multiple cookies. :) g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 31 08:50:48 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 09:50:48 -0400 Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: <20100331012539.GK5528@n0jcf.net> References: <496c74471003281329r42e4111aw94d253980dbdcfde@mail.gmail.com> <20100331012539.GK5528@n0jcf.net> Message-ID: On 3/30/10, Chris Elmquist wrote: > If you get stuck, I can sure help. I recently restored an HP 2748B > optical reader (500 CPS) and built an RS232 interface for it so that > I can read tapes into a Linux machine... and do it quickly. It's > optical and uses only a pinch roller to grab the tape so should be > minimally "damaging" to the tapes. I have more than one reader - only the ASR-33s are mechanical. The one that's the best shot to adapt at this point is the PRS/04, a portable reader (it even has a handle) that was sold with machines of the PDP-11/34 vintage when diagnostics still came on papertape but customers might have bought a VT52 instead of a teletype. It is a current loop device with plugs to sit between the console terminal and the CPU on the same loop. It has a large (i.e. gentle curve) toothed feed roller (vs pinch roller), but is optical read. I'd post a link to a picture, but I can't seem to find any examples on the 'net. It's a little larger than an external 5.25" floppy enclosure with long (more than 2m) cables, white pebbled finish, small handle... > I did this so that I could preserve hundreds of tapes I have for an > Altair 680b. Nice. -ethan From dkelvey at hotmail.com Wed Mar 31 09:37:46 2010 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 07:37:46 -0700 Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: References: <496c74471003281329r42e4111aw94d253980dbdcfde@mail.gmail.com>, , , , <20100331012539.GK5528@n0jcf.net>, Message-ID: > From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com ----snip--- > > I have more than one reader - only the ASR-33s are mechanical. The > ---snip--- Hi I have a reader that has a Intel logo but I think is a REMEX. It has a parallel out that I just wired up to a parallel printer port. I read tapes onto my old lap top. I can then load them serially to my old computer. It is a fanfold feed with optical read. I tried to manually feed it a spooled tape once and realize that that was a mistake unless I only feed it in a burst mode( ended up repairing that tape ). Dwight _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Trusted email with powerful SPAM protection. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/210850553/direct/01/ From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Mar 31 09:39:42 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 08:39:42 -0600 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> <2A4CD9A6-0CD2-4A3B-9038-08B7113E2307@neurotica.com> <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> Message-ID: <4BB35EAE.3010102@jetnet.ab.ca> E. Groenenberg wrote: >Aaarggghhh! A laser and a vintage computer(part)? > > Next stop a paperpuncher with a laser to cut the holes??? > That reminds of the write once media, that was to out 20? years ago. I saw it BYTE and was to replace floppies and other storage medium for archive use. > But interesting idea to use a laser to cut the holes in the floppy surface. > > Ed > From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Mar 31 09:54:58 2010 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (Ben) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 08:54:58 -0600 Subject: Pre-1980 DEC Technical Reports/Memoranda? In-Reply-To: <1269956504.3084.54.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <1269956504.3084.54.camel@localhost.localdomain> Message-ID: <4BB36242.8060401@jetnet.ab.ca> Rodney Brown wrote: > Where would DEC Technical Reports prior to 1980 would be found - on the > web? > The following reference is one I've never sighted, thought it was > referenced (as unsighted in Ross William's 1993 Painless guide to CRC > posting). > > Wecker, S (1974). "A Table-Lookup Algorithm for Software Computation of > Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC)". Digital Equipment Corporation > memorandum. > Suggestions or just ask HP? I remeber BYTE magizine has a similar Alogrithm, around the same time frame if you can find BYTE magazine over there in OZ. From ggs at shiresoft.com Wed Mar 31 10:01:25 2010 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 08:01:25 -0700 Subject: Pre-1980 DEC Technical Reports/Memoranda? In-Reply-To: <4BB36242.8060401@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <1269956504.3084.54.camel@localhost.localdomain> <4BB36242.8060401@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <5669E119-282B-4EE5-8E13-2932F7684825@shiresoft.com> Using table lookups for CRC computation is a well understood technique (the trick is creating the table for the specific polynomial). TTFN - Guy On Mar 31, 2010, at 7:54 AM, Ben wrote: > Rodney Brown wrote: >> Where would DEC Technical Reports prior to 1980 would be found - on the >> web? >> The following reference is one I've never sighted, thought it was >> referenced (as unsighted in Ross William's 1993 Painless guide to CRC >> posting). >> >> Wecker, S (1974). "A Table-Lookup Algorithm for Software Computation of >> Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC)". Digital Equipment Corporation >> memorandum. > > > >> Suggestions or just ask HP? > > I remeber BYTE magizine has a similar Alogrithm, around the same time frame if you can find BYTE magazine over there in OZ. > > > > From robert at irrelevant.com Wed Mar 31 10:12:37 2010 From: robert at irrelevant.com (Rob) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 16:12:37 +0100 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: <4BB35EAE.3010102@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> <2A4CD9A6-0CD2-4A3B-9038-08B7113E2307@neurotica.com> <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> <4BB35EAE.3010102@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: On 31 March 2010 15:39, Ben wrote: > E. Groenenberg wrote: >> >> Aaarggghhh! A laser and a vintage computer(part)? >> >> Next stop a paperpuncher with a laser to cut the holes??? >> > That reminds of the write once media, that was to out 20? > years ago. Reminds me of an actual paper hole "punch" that I encountered at Ferranti back in my youth in the print room. We used to photo-copy compter manuals and transport them over to this beast. You could put a 2" or more high stack of paper on it, clamp it down, and have it *drill* through the stack at the relevant points for the ring binders. Beat feeding it three sheets at a time through the desktop punch! Hey, those manuals would be on-topic now :-) More recently, I've seen laser cutters for sheet steel - now those are impressive! I was shown what looked like a paper doily, but turned out to be made of 6mm thick steel!! Impressive. Rob From fjkraan at xs4all.nl Wed Mar 31 10:48:48 2010 From: fjkraan at xs4all.nl (F.J. Kraan) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 17:48:48 +0200 Subject: Epson QX-10 available for shipping (somewhere in the USA) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BB36EE0.4050402@xs4all.nl> This owner wants to donate an Epson QX-10 to an interested collector: > HI! > My e-mail address is pb38sage at centurytel.net > . I am writing this on a friends > computer, so please reply to my address. > > I have a QX-10 Epson computer and all of the original software plus > other software I purchased for it, Epson Lifeboat users magazines, etc. > > I hate to dump them at the recycle center if they are of any value to > anyone. I would be willing to send for the cost of shipping (and > might even be willing to send anyhow). > I just can't bare to throw this all in the trash. > > Pauline Braymen > pb38sage at centurytel.net > > Yes, my computer still works. Fred Jan Kraan From feedle at feedle.net Wed Mar 31 12:02:55 2010 From: feedle at feedle.net (C. Sullivan) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 10:02:55 -0700 Subject: Epson QX-10 available for shipping (somewhere in the USA) In-Reply-To: <4BB36EE0.4050402@xs4all.nl> References: <4BB36EE0.4050402@xs4all.nl> Message-ID: <4BB3803F.8090808@feedle.net> On 3/31/2010 8:48 AM, F.J. Kraan wrote: > This owner wants to donate an Epson QX-10 to an interested collector: Can you give us an idea as to where in the US? If it is in the Pacific Northwest, I'd actually pick it up to save on shipping. From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 31 12:13:11 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 13:13:11 -0400 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> <2A4CD9A6-0CD2-4A3B-9038-08B7113E2307@neurotica.com> <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> <4BB35EAE.3010102@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: On Mar 31, 2010, at 11:12 AM, Rob wrote: > Reminds me of an actual paper hole "punch" that I encountered at > Ferranti back in my youth in the print room. We used to photo-copy > compter manuals and transport them over to this beast. You could put > a 2" or more high stack of paper on it, clamp it down, and have it > *drill* through the stack at the relevant points for the ring binders. > Beat feeding it three sheets at a time through the desktop punch! Yep, pretty cool. Paper drills are about as common as, oh, printing presses in the printing industry. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 31 12:33:05 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 13:33:05 -0400 Subject: Speaking of paper tape.... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 3/30/10, Ian King wrote: > Does anyone out there have some or all of the "Paper Tape System" tapes for > the PDP-11/20? We have a couple of 11/20s with the basic 4kW installed, and > I'd like to set up a machine to demonstrate the life of a paper-tape-based > programmer. Once those are available in some form, I'd love a copy, too (I could send a box of fanfold tape or I could accept modern byte-stream files and punch my own). I have a 16kW PDP-11/20 that's on my list to start restoring this year (it used to have more memory, but other co-workers souvenired some of the core planes). In my case, it's no hurry, but I wanted to stick my hand in the air if software like this is being dug out. Thanks, -ethan From aek at bitsavers.org Wed Mar 31 13:10:10 2010 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 11:10:10 -0700 Subject: PTS-11 (was Re: Speaking of paper tape....) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4BB39002.2030306@bitsavers.org> On 3/30/10 4:01 PM, Ian King wrote: > Does anyone out there have some or all of the "Paper Tape System" tapes for the PDP-11/20? look in http://bitsavers.org/bits/DEC/pdp11/papertapeimages/20031230/ From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 31 13:41:02 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 11:41:02 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> <2A4CD9A6-0CD2-4A3B-9038-08B7113E2307@neurotica.com> <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> Message-ID: <20100331112953.F9071@shell.lmi.net> On Wed, 31 Mar 2010, E. Groenenberg wrote: > Aaarggghhh! A laser and a vintage computer(part)? There are vintage lasers. And it would be far from the first vintage computer use of a laser. Remember Vault Corp. "Pro-Lock"? They created a copy-protection scheme based upon making and looking for a physical scratch in the disk surface. As a second stage, if their software could successfully re-write at the location of the scratch, then it knew that the disk was bogus. But, Vulture Capitalists would not be attracted to a workroom with a bunch of workers with paperclips scratching disks. So, to make the scratch, they used a "laser fingerprint"! Later, they did one of the most spectacular foot shootings, ever! They announced that "Pro-Lock 2" would retaliate against computers using bogus copies! ("with a VIRUS!!") As far as I know, they never sold a single copy of "Pro-Lock 2", and EVERY customer of "Pro-Lock 1" discontinued immmediately; many with public announcements. For years, the least informed Q&A people in magazines would blame problems that they didn't understand on "maybe a virus, or maybe a copy-protection program that went bad". -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 31 13:53:53 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 11:53:53 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> <2A4CD9A6-0CD2-4A3B-9038-08B7113E2307@neurotica.com> <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> <4BB35EAE.3010102@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <20100331115303.F9071@shell.lmi.net> On Wed, 31 Mar 2010, Rob wrote: > Reminds me of an actual paper hole "punch" that I encountered at > Ferranti back in my youth in the print room. We used to photo-copy > compter manuals and transport them over to this beast. You could put > a 2" or more high stack of paper on it, clamp it down, and have it > *drill* through the stack at the relevant points for the ring binders. > Beat feeding it three sheets at a time through the desktop punch! > Hey, those manuals would be on-topic now :-) A Paper Drill is an essential tool for anybody who works with manuals more than a dozen pages long. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 31 13:26:21 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 19:26:21 +0100 (BST) Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: <20100331012539.GK5528@n0jcf.net> from "Chris Elmquist" at Mar 30, 10 08:25:39 pm Message-ID: > If you get stuck, I can sure help. I recently restored an HP 2748B > optical reader (500 CPS) and built an RS232 interface for it so that I restored one of thoise a couple of years back -- or actually the -A version which has simpler electronics (but much the same functionality). I got the HP9800 interface for it (HP11202 Opt A01 IIRC) on E-bay. As you probably know the outputs of the 2748 are pilled up to 12V, but through 10k resisotrs, whcih means they will feed the 180R/390R-terminated TTL inputs of the 11202 with no prolems. Of course the -B model that you have has clamp diodes anyway so you can force the outputs to TTL levels by jumpering 2 pins on the connector. What was wrong with yous? Mine had a bad mbearing in the magnetic clutch. T oreplace that I had to make special tools to press the clutch unit aprt and put it togetehr again. The ball race itself was a standard size and I had no problems getting one. Of course I also had to make the alignment mandrel to ge the clutch parts centred up wehn I put the motor unit back on. There are a few photos in my flickr account (tony_duell) of the internals of the read head and of taking the motor/clutch apart. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 31 13:15:29 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 19:15:29 +0100 (BST) Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: from "Ethan Dicks" at Mar 30, 10 05:27:20 pm Message-ID: > > On 3/30/10, Tony Duell wrote: > >> Perhaps someone on the list has a tar file full of digitized DECUS > >> papertapes? > > > > What the heck is a digitised paper tape? Paper tape is digital anyway. > > Poor choice of words on my part. OK... I was worried for a moment that somebdy had tried to archive paper tapes by scanning them a foot at a time on a flatbed scanner or something equally daft -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 31 13:44:41 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 19:44:41 +0100 (BST) Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: <4BB2BC44.7000204@jetnet.ab.ca> from "Ben" at Mar 30, 10 09:06:44 pm Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > >> Perhaps someone on the list has a tar file full of digitized DECUS papertap= > >> es? > > > > What the heck is a digitised paper tape? Paper tape is digital anyway. > > Scanned paper tape, comes to mind. That's what worried me... > Pick up '"Unearthing the PDP-15 Operating Systems", by Bob Supnik' > from the simh site. Oh $deity... > > > -tony > > > I still consider paper tape to be more analog, so I suspect digitized > paper tape is the tape processed some way into a file. Eh? Ever piece of paper tape I've ever used, every punch and every reader,. dependsd on the presence or absence of a holes. The hole is either there or not. There are no half-holes. That to me makes it a digital storage medium. In what sense is it analogue? Are you also going to claim that CDs, DVDs and floppy disks are analogue? What about flash memory devices? -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 31 13:18:20 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 19:18:20 +0100 (BST) Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: from "Ethan Dicks" at Mar 30, 10 05:39:31 pm Message-ID: > storage. Building a current loop adapter from scratch might be the > fastest path. I have an ASR33 and a DEC PRS/04 reader (both current > loop, one 110 bps, one faster, IIRC). I don't know the PRS/04, but if it's modern enough to use TTL ICs (or at least 5V logic levels), you might be able to find a TTL level serial dta stream at the input to the curent loop drive stange inside. Tap that off and feed it to a 1488 (if you have +/-12V available) or a MAX232 (if you don;'t) and get RS232 that way. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 31 13:19:52 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 19:19:52 +0100 (BST) Subject: Siemens 'Pocket Reader' In-Reply-To: <4BB27739.8090006@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Mar 30, 10 11:12:09 pm Message-ID: > Joerg Schuler did an open-source PReader driver for Linux -- it's on the > above website. Thanks. I've downloaded the linux software soruces (at least it's small...) and have taken a quick look. I can read C, but German is more of a problem, so the comments are going to take some translating... -tony From quapla at xs4all.nl Wed Mar 31 14:43:16 2010 From: quapla at xs4all.nl (E. Groenenberg) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 21:43:16 +0200 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: <20100331112953.F9071@shell.lmi.net> References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net> <2A4CD9A6-0CD2-4A3B-9038-08B7113E2307@neurotica.com> <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> <20100331112953.F9071@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4567899290311988b8239841575e0d67.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl> > On Wed, 31 Mar 2010, E. Groenenberg wrote: >> Aaarggghhh! A laser and a vintage computer(part)? > > There are vintage lasers. > And it would be far from the first vintage computer use of a laser. > That's true, but at that time they were mostly of scientific use. > Remember Vault Corp. "Pro-Lock"? > They created a copy-protection scheme based upon making and looking for a > physical scratch in the disk surface. As a second stage, if their > software could successfully re-write at the location of the scratch, then > it knew that the disk was bogus. > On it's own not a bad idea, as it looks. > But, Vulture Capitalists would not be attracted to a workroom with a bunch > of workers with paperclips scratching disks. So, to make the scratch, > they used a "laser fingerprint"! > > Later, they did one of the most spectacular foot shootings, ever! > They announced that "Pro-Lock 2" would retaliate against computers using > bogus copies! ("with a VIRUS!!") > Ha!, that would indeed be hitting the 'self destruct' button as a company. > As far as I know, they never sold a single copy of "Pro-Lock 2", and EVERY > customer of "Pro-Lock 1" discontinued immediately; many with public > announcements. For years, the least informed Q&A people in magazines > would blame problems that they didn't understand on "maybe a virus, or > maybe a copy-protection program that went bad". > > During my time at Oracle we did produce our own floppy distribution kits for the European market, (the 5 1/4" ones too). In version 4 there was a key floppy which was needed to start the DB on MSDOS. After starting, it could be removed. Guess what, after a short period of time, some people did find a way to duplicate the 'key' floppy so they did buy a single set and used it in many PC's. After that, Oracle didn't bother to add a license key mechanism to their core software. Just wondering, of these V4 MSDOS kits, many thousands have been sold, and they have must been nearly everywhere. Anybody remember them? > -- > Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com > Ed -- Dit is een HTML vrije email / This is an HTML free email. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 31 14:46:25 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 15:46:25 -0400 Subject: Reading ancient paper digital media (was Re: Hamurabi Focal source) Message-ID: On 3/31/10, Tony Duell wrote: > OK... I was worried for a moment that somebdy had tried to archive paper > tapes by scanning them a foot at a time on a flatbed scanner or something > equally daft I did that exact thing with punched cards as an experiment. I did not (and still don't) have a punched card reader, but I have a correspondence course in "Data Processing" I picked up at a thrift store that came complete with blank coding forms and punch cards as teaching aids for the homework. I put the punchcard in a flatbed scanner with the unprinted side down (the "back" side) with a dark backing sheet to contrast the holes. I scanned it to a TIFF then converted it to a GIF and used Tom Boutell's GD library to import it into a C application that did some simple image transformations (edge detection, etc). I didn't complete the code to the point of converting spots to bits, but I did scale and locate the card in the scan area and was on the verge of writing the code to check for holes when I got distracted and set it aside. Making an 8 or 9 channel papertape reader from scratch is not an impossible exercise (witness the ancient Byte article referenced here every so often). Making a punchcard reader from scratch is a very different level of effort, so back then I figured that it'd be easier to use a flatbed scanner than try to make a 12-level reader and mechanical feed system on my own. These days, though, with inexpensive fabrication tools (access to laser cutters, home CNCs, Makerbots, etc) it might _not_ be as hard to make a punchcard reader from scratch as it was 10 years ago. -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Wed Mar 31 14:56:26 2010 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 12:56:26 -0700 Subject: Making Hard Sector Floppies In-Reply-To: <20100331112953.F9071@shell.lmi.net> References: <4BB2113F.3070207@west.net>, <690fb940d66b93b5f4bf28d5bb3ebc4b.squirrel@webmail.xs4all.nl>, <20100331112953.F9071@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BB3467A.16385.D3102A@cclist.sydex.com> On 31 Mar 2010 at 11:41, Fred Cisin wrote: > As far as I know, they never sold a single copy of "Pro-Lock 2", and > EVERY customer of "Pro-Lock 1" discontinued immmediately; many with > public announcements. For years, the least informed Q&A people in > magazines would blame problems that they didn't understand on "maybe a > virus, or maybe a copy-protection program that went bad". I remember when IBM demoed their initial PS/2 models that they used a copy-protection-hacked version of Lotus 1-2-3, as no legitimate copies existed in 3.5" format then. It was a little embarrassing. I think they used CopyWrite, but I'm not certain. The SPA ran their "Don't Copy That Floppy" campaign well into the mid- to-late 90s. Did anyone ever *really* pay $100K for owning a single illegal copy of "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego" as their ads claimed? --Chuck From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Mar 31 15:08:17 2010 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 21:08:17 +0100 (BST) Subject: Reading ancient paper digital media (was Re: Hamurabi Focal source) In-Reply-To: from "Ethan Dicks" at Mar 31, 10 03:46:25 pm Message-ID: > Making an 8 or 9 channel papertape reader from scratch is not an > impossible exercise (witness the ancient Byte article referenced here It's actuially fairly simple. The complicated bit of most commerical readers is having to stop reliably on _this_ chracter, after reading at full speed. For archiing tapes, assuming the machine you're using for the archiving can keep up with the reader, you don't need this at all. Just start the tape moving and grab the characters as they come. > every so often). Making a punchcard reader from scratch is a very > different level of effort, so back then I figured that it'd be easier Yes. The main problem is that there is no 'clock track' on a punched card. On paper tape you can use the smaller sprocket holes as a timing reference. on cards you have nothing like that, there will be blank columns with no holes punched at all. The way my reader (A Documation M200) does it is to move the card at constant speed using known-diamter rollers, then to detect the leading edge of the card (basically when the optical sensors g form all on to all off, then use that to produce an internal clock signal that should align with the centres of the columns (if you see what I mean) and us that to strobe the read logic. My other card reader is mechancial (not optical) and partly home-made. I got a reading head from some surplus plave. It has 480 (40 columns of 12) mechancial contacs and a solenoid to lift the card against these contacts. It reeads half the length of a stanard 80 column card and then you put the card i nthe other way round to read the other half. I added a board of logic chips to scna the columns (the unit came with a PCB containing decodrs so you just had to give it a binary column number and a ROM to turn the 12 row Hollerith code into ASCII), and then revese the scan direction to read the second half of the card. It probably would have been simplier with a microcontroller, but this was years ago, and anyway the necessary TTL fitted easily onto a 6" * 4" prototyping board. -tony From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Mar 31 15:36:11 2010 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 16:36:11 -0400 Subject: Reading ancient paper digital media (was Re: Hamurabi Focal source) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 3/31/10, Tony Duell wrote: >> Making an 8 or 9 channel papertape reader from scratch is not an >> impossible exercise (witness the ancient Byte article referenced here > > It's actuially fairly simple. The complicated bit of most commerical > readers is having to stop reliably on _this_ chracter, after reading at > full speed. Indeed. > For archiing tapes, assuming the machine you're using for the > archiving can keep up with the reader, you don't need this at all. Just > start the tape moving and grab the characters as they come. Yep, and the Byte article design has the phototransistor for the sprocket track installed "backwards" with respect to the 8 data tracks such that the sprocket track fires later (due to mechanical asymmetry in how phototransistors are manufactured) which enables it to trivially work as a latch pulse (since the data channels were exposed to light earlier and have had a chance to settle/allow the holes to more completely match the sensitive spots of their phototransistors). >> every so often). Making a punchcard reader from scratch is a very >> different level of effort, so back then I figured that it'd be easier > > Yes. The main problem is that there is no 'clock track' on a punched card. > On paper tape you can use the smaller sprocket holes as a timing > reference. on cards you have nothing like that, there will be blank > columns with no holes punched at all. The way my reader (A Documation > M200) does it is to move the card at constant speed using known-diamter > rollers, then to detect the leading edge of the card. Yep. I think that's a common approach for optical sensors. For my TIFF/GIF-based "reader", I did edge detection of a snapshot of the entire card to check for scale and orientation so that once the leading edge was identified in software, it shouldn't be difficult to scan along the long axis, looking for a dark spot or the absence of a dark spot every so many pixels (depending on the scan resolution). It doesn't matter if you scan at 75 dpi, 300 dpi, or more - it's all proportional to the detected height and width of the outer edges of the card image. You do have to keep the card mostly perpendicular to the edge of the scanner or there needs to be smarter code than I wrote to detect the silhouette of the card (it starts at each edge of the image and works its way to the middle, looking for active pixels in the high-frequency-filtered version of the card scan - it should still work if you are not 100% square to the scanner, but not if it's more than 1-2mm off-axis). > My other card reader is mechancial (not optical) and partly home-made. I > got a reading head from some surplus plave. It has 480 (40 columns of 12) > mechancial contacs and a solenoid to lift the card against these > contacts. It reeads half the length of a stanard 80 column card and then > you put the card i nthe other way round to read the other half. That's an interesting approach. It might not be so expensive these days to make a PCB-based mechanical scanner, but I would personally rather work on an optical column-at-a-time scanner than a multiple-hundred-mechanical-connection electrical scanner. If I had a reader head to start with as you did, I might feel differently. It's an interesting approach, though. -ethan From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 31 16:34:41 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 14:34:41 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reading ancient paper digital media (was Re: Hamurabi Focal source) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100331142910.S15206@shell.lmi.net> > Yes. The main problem is that there is no 'clock track' on a punched card. > On paper tape you can use the smaller sprocket holes as a timing > reference. on cards you have nothing like that, there will be blank > columns with no holes punched at all. The way my reader (A Documation > M200) does it is to move the card at constant speed using known-diamter > rollers, then to detect the leading edge of the card. IBM used to use a known diameter BRASS roller. It was based on a combination of which wire brush made contact with the roller and the rotational position of the roller. An unreliable source (my father), IBM's patents on that were a major impetus for the development of photo-detecting readers, and that IBM's attempt to shut out competitors actually caused them (CDC?) to leapfrog ahead. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 31 16:45:00 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 14:45:00 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reading ancient paper digital media (was Re: Hamurabi Focal source) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100331143528.C15206@shell.lmi.net> > My other card reader is mechancial (not optical) and partly home-made. I > got a reading head from some surplus plave. It has 480 (40 columns of 12) > mechancial contacs and a solenoid to lift the card against these > contacts. It reeads half the length of a stanard 80 column card and then > you put the card i nthe other way round to read the other half. I used to have a Wang card reader. It had 480 contacts, but they were every other column. It was for "Hanging Chad" port-a-punch type cards. It was a large clamshell that you manually opened, placed a card in it, and manually closed. Therefore, it was not for high-volume service-bureau card deck reading - slightly slower than keying in the data. I had previously used a Wang desktop programmable calculator that had one. If you wanted to read a normal 80 column card, you could read the card, turn it over, and read the other columns, since the margins for IBM cards were symmetrical. On the Wang calculator, I used an 026, and made "flippy" cards for some of the more commonly used macros. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Wed Mar 31 21:32:11 2010 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 19:32:11 -0700 Subject: Reading ancient paper digital media (was Re: Hamurabi Focal source) References: <20100331143528.C15206@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4BB405AA.7FBC7E91@cs.ubc.ca> Fred Cisin wrote: > > > My other card reader is mechancial (not optical) and partly home-made. I > > got a reading head from some surplus plave. It has 480 (40 columns of 12) > > mechancial contacs and a solenoid to lift the card against these > > contacts. It reeads half the length of a stanard 80 column card and then > > you put the card i nthe other way round to read the other half. > > I used to have a Wang card reader. It had 480 contacts, but they were > every other column. It was for "Hanging Chad" port-a-punch type cards. It > was a large clamshell that you manually opened, placed a card in it, and > manually closed. Therefore, it was not for high-volume service-bureau > card deck reading - slightly slower than keying in the data. I had > previously used a Wang desktop programmable calculator that had one. If > you wanted to read a normal 80 column card, you could read the card, turn > it over, and read the other columns, since the margins for IBM cards were > symmetrical. On the Wang calculator, I used an 026, and made "flippy" > cards for some of the more commonly used macros. I have one such reader (a Wang C11 Card Programmer), physically kind of like an old-style side-loading toaster. Sadly, I don't have the calculator it went with. Hadn't thought of using it for 80-column cards but looking at it I see it should work as you suggest (but then, I don't have any 80-colummn cards that need reading, and it would be rather painful for any quantity of them.) The scanning circuitry is all self-contained, but the scan is not in the normal column order, it reads 4 bits of 2 sequential columns (8 bits total) at a time. It should interface directly to a parallel port. Don't know how reliable it would be though, the contacts are not gold-plated and there is little wipe of the contacts during the load-unload process. From dbwood at kc.rr.com Wed Mar 31 21:52:37 2010 From: dbwood at kc.rr.com (dbwood at kc.rr.com) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 21:52:37 -0500 Subject: Epson QX-10 available for shipping (somewhere in the USA) In-Reply-To: <4BB36EE0.4050402@xs4all.nl> Message-ID: <20100401025237.XB46Z.627347.root@hrndva-web28-z02> I'd be interested in this... how much for shipping? Douglas Wood Leavenworth, KS ---- "F.J. Kraan" wrote: > This owner wants to donate an Epson QX-10 to an interested collector: > > > HI! > > My e-mail address is pb38sage at centurytel.net > > . I am writing this on a friends > > computer, so please reply to my address. > > > > I have a QX-10 Epson computer and all of the original software plus > > other software I purchased for it, Epson Lifeboat users magazines, etc. > > > > I hate to dump them at the recycle center if they are of any value to > > anyone. I would be willing to send for the cost of shipping (and > > might even be willing to send anyhow). > > I just can't bare to throw this all in the trash. > > > > Pauline Braymen > > pb38sage at centurytel.net > > > > Yes, my computer still works. > > > Fred Jan Kraan From keithvz at verizon.net Wed Mar 31 22:24:26 2010 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 23:24:26 -0400 Subject: need old DB9F<->HD15M VGA adapter or cable Message-ID: <4BB411EA.4090708@verizon.net> I currently have my Amiga 500 hooked up to an old multisync monitor by way of a DB23 female to DB9 male cable. The monitor port is labeled "signal analog." I've confirmed that my pinouts for the DB23 connector match this http://l8r.net/technical/t-db23video.shtml I'm now trying to attach my amiga to a standard LCD by way of chinese scan converter bought from ebay. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=250593765979&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT The resolution is typically 320 x 200 at 15.75khz for horizontal sync. The scan converter claims to support this just fine. I need a small adapter to bring the DB9M from this proprietary DB23<->DB9 cable to the HD15 so it will interface to this board. I can potentially hack together a cable, but I think these adapters, at one time, were pretty popular. Does anyone have one lying around that they wouldn't mind parting with? Would this do the trick? http://www.amazon.com/Female-HD15-Male-Adaptor-Molded/dp/B000I97FGA Thanks Keith From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 31 23:39:06 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 1 Apr 2010 00:39:06 -0400 Subject: Reading ancient paper digital media (was Re: Hamurabi Focal source) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mar 31, 2010, at 4:08 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> every so often). Making a punchcard reader from scratch is a very >> different level of effort, so back then I figured that it'd be easier > > Yes. The main problem is that there is no 'clock track' on a punched card. > On paper tape you can use the smaller sprocket holes as a timing > reference. on cards you have nothing like that, there will be blank > columns with no holes punched at all. I wonder if this could be handled with a simple PLL-based clock-recovery circuit. I suppose the ones density isn't exactly guaranteed though. > The way my reader (A Documation > M200) does it is to move the card at constant speed using known-diamter > rollers, then to detect the leading edge of the card (basically when the > optical sensors g form all on to all off, then use that to produce an > internal clock signal that should align with the centres of the columns > (if you see what I mean) and us that to strobe the read logic. What if the card slips? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Mar 31 23:54:07 2010 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 21:54:07 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Reading ancient paper digital media (was Re: Hamurabi Focal source) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20100331215042.B27295@shell.lmi.net> On Thu, 1 Apr 2010, Dave McGuire wrote: > > The way my reader (A Documation > > M200) does it is to move the card at constant speed using known-diamter > > rollers, then to detect the leading edge of the card (basically when the > > optical sensors g form all on to all off, then use that to produce an > > internal clock signal that should align with the centres of the columns > > (if you see what I mean) and us that to strobe the read logic. > > What if the card slips? Then the far edge of the card shows up at the wrong time, and the reader generates a fault. Use to happen (rarely) with the IBM card readers. From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Mar 31 23:58:02 2010 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 1 Apr 2010 00:58:02 -0400 Subject: Reading ancient paper digital media (was Re: Hamurabi Focal source) In-Reply-To: <20100331215042.B27295@shell.lmi.net> References: <20100331215042.B27295@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Apr 1, 2010, at 12:54 AM, Fred Cisin wrote: >>> The way my reader (A Documation >>> M200) does it is to move the card at constant speed using known-diamter >>> rollers, then to detect the leading edge of the card (basically when the >>> optical sensors g form all on to all off, then use that to produce an >>> internal clock signal that should align with the centres of the columns >>> (if you see what I mean) and us that to strobe the read logic. >> >> What if the card slips? > > Then the far edge of the card shows up at the wrong time, and the reader > generates a fault. Use to happen (rarely) with the IBM card readers. Ahhhhhh I see. Can they re-feed, or would that be the operator's responsibility? (I've never used a real IBM card reader) -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From chrise at pobox.com Wed Mar 31 16:24:12 2010 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 16:24:12 -0500 Subject: Hamurabi Focal source In-Reply-To: References: <20100331012539.GK5528@n0jcf.net> Message-ID: <20100331212412.GJ6972@n0jcf.net> On Wednesday (03/31/2010 at 07:26PM +0100), Tony Duell wrote: > > If you get stuck, I can sure help. I recently restored an HP 2748B > > optical reader (500 CPS) and built an RS232 interface for it so that > > I restored one of thoise a couple of years back -- or actually the -A > version which has simpler electronics (but much the same functionality). > I got the HP9800 interface for it (HP11202 Opt A01 IIRC) on E-bay. As you > probably know the outputs of the 2748 are pilled up to 12V, but through > 10k resisotrs, whcih means they will feed the 180R/390R-terminated TTL > inputs of the 11202 with no prolems. Of course the -B model that you have > has clamp diodes anyway so you can force the outputs to TTL levels by > jumpering 2 pins on the connector. Indeed. I was a little worried about depending on that jumper (and the associated connector pins) to ensure that the zener clamp would stay in place else fry my microcontroller. So, I put a front-end on the micro using 26LS32 line receivers and accept the 12V levels directly or any level above about a volt I guess. > What was wrong with yous? Mine had a bad mbearing in the magnetic clutch. > T oreplace that I had to make special tools to press the clutch unit > aprt and put it togetehr again. The ball race itself was a standard size > and I had no problems getting one. Of course I also had to make the > alignment mandrel to ge the clutch parts centred up wehn I put the motor > unit back on. Wow. I was much more lucky. Mine had numerous burned out blubs in the illumination head and a bad transistor on one of the detector channels. And it was pretty dirty inside. But, mechanically, I think I lucked out. > There are a few photos in my flickr account (tony_duell) of the internals > of the read head and of taking the motor/clutch apart. Cool. I'll check it out. Mine works real nice for reading these old tapes. I posted a thing to this list a year ago or so... that the problem I have with the tapes is that they were stored for years and years with a rubber band around each one... the oil on the tapes eventually dissolved those rubber bands into very sticky, gooey messes that have soaked into many of the tapes. At the very least they are stained with the blue, green, red, pink or whatever color rubber band used to be around them and at the worst, the goo is glueing the tape together and will take careful attention to unstick without tearing the tape. I even have one of M$ Gates original 4K BASIC for the Altair 680 still in unopened, original packaging. Unfortunately, this too had a rubber band around it and there's a big puddle of goo in the bag along with the tape. Sigh. -- Chris Elmquist