Subject: No space for vinatge computers in australia (fwd)

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 20 10:18:00 2003

Ok you funny talking folks on the upside-down island, you have a job to
do:

Chips are down for computer museum
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/05/19/1053196515142.html

The Australian Computer Museum Society is about to lose its space and
needs 1,000 square meters to move its collection into.  They have to find
something within 6 weeks because they say it'll take six months to move
their collection, and they must be out bu January 1, 2004.

-- 

Sellam Ismail                                        Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger                http://www.vintage.org

 * Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *

---

From: "TeoZ" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 20 10:29:37 2003

They should EBAY the duplicates or gut them for spares, that way they
wouldnt need the same footprint. For a museium to have many multiples of the
same item is a waste of space (which costs money).

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 20 11:12:00 2003

> same item is a waste of space (which costs money).

I agree to an extent but I think the reporter doesn't understand computer
technology.  The article only says they have "10 mainframes" and "60
minicomputers and 50 microcomputers".  I suppose if you have an IBM 709
then you don't really need the Univac?  And since the Commodore 64, Apple
][ and Atari 800 all use the 6502, 2 of the 3 can go?

I think not ;)

--

---

From: "TeoZ" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 20 11:52:00 2003

The reporter stated that they take all donations instead of having them
scrapped, so I figured they have multiples of the common
computers/servers/mainframes in that area of the world.

50 micro's dont take up much space, 10 mainframes do.

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 20 12:22:01 2003

> computers/servers/mainframes in that area of the world.

Oh, well yeah, that makes sense ;)  I'm the same way, and just haven't
gotten around to performing The Great Cull yet.

Soon, though.

--

---

From: "TeoZ" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 20 12:38:01 2003

I try not to have 2 of the same model/type computer, but I have quite a few
spare cards for my computers (mostly pc stuff). If I have more then 20
functioning computers of all types I would be surprised. My problem is once
I get a machine I have an itch to max it out with all the
cards/memory/options available.

---

From: Hans B Pufal <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed May 21 09:35:52 2003

> same item is a waste of space (which costs money).

This idea of dumping duplicates comes up in our internal discussions at 
ACONIT every few months. The discussions get heated every time. Some of 
us do not see the value of ANY duplicates, others (in the same camp as 
myself) want to keep EVERYTHING.

I do admit that some of what we collect could probably be junked, the 
problem is knowing what. Without an in depth and knowlegeable 
examination you just cannot make a reasonable decision.

My favorite argument is that if the dump the duplicate argument had won 
the day we would most probably have dumped one of our two PDP-9's and in 
that case would probably never have gotten one to operational state.

  -- hbp

---

From: Mike Ford <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed May 21 18:13:00 2003

The point of storage is to store stuff, unless its full what you are 
wasting is space.

When your storage is totally full, and more storage isn't possible, THEN 
you have to start making choices.

OTOH if you are a museum why not buy some space in a salt mine or something 
out in the boonies?

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu May 22 23:23:00 2003

> that case would probably never have gotten one to operational state.

This is one of the reasons why I keep at least two of everything.

--

---

From: "TeoZ" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu May 22 23:41:01 2003

Are the computers at a museum run at all? How much of an old
computer/mainframe is repairable with modern components and how much is
custom equipment that needs spares? I would think the museums have static
displays and are mostly worried about them being complete, but not worried
about functionality. Over the years how many people are still around who can
operate, repair, or maintain 50's era computers? Power requirements would
also be a pain for the older models.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Vintage Computer Festival" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Sent: Friday, May 23, 2003 12:16 AM
Subject: Re: Collection policy was Re: No space for vinatge computers in
australia (fwd)

---

From: Hans B Pufal <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri May 23 20:56:37 2003

TeoZ wrote:
> custom equipment that needs spares? 

So far we have over a dozen machines known to be in working order 
ranging from a PDP-9 an IBM 1130, through to microcomputer systems. We 
have, so far, never had the need to replace any original component with 
modern replacements though we have had discussions as to how and why 
such a replacemnt would be justified.

> I would think the museums have static
> about functionality. 

I agree, but their worry is unfounded. Since they will never run the 
machines they may as well completely gut them and show simply the 
cabinet, its all you see in most cases anyway!

I had a discussion with a museum from whom we wanted to borrow a 
machine, the last known example,  in order to restore it to working 
order. They said that was not int heir charter and that they wanted to 
preserve the machine in the state they found it. What a waste!!!!

This is my main gripe about museums, a static display loses over 90% of 
the interest of a machine. What use knowing the size and color of the 
cabinet if you have no insigght into what went on inside!

> Over the years how many people are still around who can

This is clearly an issue we need to pass on these skills to a younger 
generation. Here at ACONIT our goal is a conservatoire of computing 
history, hopefully as such it will perpetuate the skills needed. The 
issue of resoucres is clearly important also.

   -- hbp

---

From: "TeoZ" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri May 23 21:53:00 2003

Well some museum people function like archeologists, they want to leave the
machine in the state they found it in the wild. People like you want to
restore the machine to the same state it left the factory most likely. Very
few computers that are put out to pasture are probably in the state they
were when they were sold and shipped. Along the way addons are released that
increase functionality, speed, reliability, etc just like the PC today that
you buy will probably get trashed in 5 years with completely different guts,
storage, memory etc. Who is to say whats wrong and whats right in what state
is correct for that machine?

Like I said before museums have static displays for reasons of power
requirements, lack of personnel that can run the machines, spare parts that
are expensive and hard to find, and the fact that a screwup during operation
could actually destroy one of the few remaining examples (or only one). Most
devices in a museum are there for either art or function (or combination).
The older machines are not much to look at without being powered up and
running. I am 34 years old and I have seen a punch card reader, but never
seen one hooked up and running. I have never used an 8" floppy, or run the
earliest PC's that did computations via dip switch settings on the front
panel. the only mainframe I have ever used was in colege doing fortran
programming and that machine wasnt even in the same state. I have to admit
there is nothing like running a complex fortran program in .001 seconds
(would have taken an hour on the PC's we had at the time) to get an answer
and then waiting 20 minutes for the local monster printer to spit out the
answer and get it posted into my mailbox.

Firearms have evolved over 100's of years and the original versions still
have alot in common with current units. People of today can relate to how
the original versions were used even without using one. Compare this to
computers that are only 60+ years old. Does a person who has a PC today have
any idea what the monster computer that took up a whole room in 1946 does
and how? There was no monitor, no keyboard, and no mouse they are totally
different today, how can people relate to this? While there are still a few
people who know how to make a horseshoe at a blacksmiths there will be
nobody who knows how to run the early mainframes in 50 years, things are
changing too fast. Static displays with a video of what they looked like
when running will be all thats left (if people are smart enough to record
the thing running before the last operator or machine is to old).

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Hans B Pufal" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Sent: Friday, May 23, 2003 4:28 AM
Subject: Re: Collection policy was Re: No space for vinatge computers in
australia (fwd)

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat May 24 01:19:00 2003

> is correct for that machine?

With older machines it is important to know what technologies the
manufacture implemented to design their machine, because this is then how
we determine the state of the art for various eras.  Modifications to the
machine would have been in the form of engineering updates or additional
features or instructions.  So the machine as it came from the factory and
a machine that came out of production may have considerable differences
worth studying, because it would indicate a change over time (years
usually) as the technology advanced.

Nowadays, that technological progression is measured in months, and less.
Plus the technology is homegenous: it's all mostly PC.  So the changes are
usually not that significant or extraordinary or interesting.

I think the right way to display a machine is to get it working while
simultaneously preserving its historical fabric.  The Computer History
Museum revived an IBM 1620 in a very intelligent way: they used whatever
modern parts were necessary to get it running again (in this case
semiconductor memory to replace the damaged core plane) but they made all
the modifications in a non-destructive, easily reversible fashion, i.e. no
permanent modifications to the original machine.  More information on the
project can be found here:

http://www.computerhistory.org/volunteers/past_volunteers/IBM1620/

This is a really common sense approach to restoration and preservation.

> could actually destroy one of the few remaining examples (or only one). Most

Is it better to try and fail to restore a machine than to just leave it
static fretting that it might be destroyed in the process?  What is
destroyed?  Killing a rare (or one-of-a-kind) chip?  If you put the best
people on the job and something goes wrong then I think that's better than
never having tried a restoration to begin with.  I mean, the thing isn't
going to explode or anything.  Worst case a chip fries or a board burns
up.

--

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Sat May 24 18:08:00 2003

> cabinet if you have no insigght into what went on inside!

I agree. The problem seems to be that many of the traditional exhibits in 
museums (fine art, archeology, etc) _are_ static objects and the 
appearence is, in general all that matters and all that can be observed. 
This is _not_ true of computers (or other scientific and 
engineering-related objects), but the museums don't seem to realise this 
and apply the same policies to all objects.

If all the meusume is interested in is the appearance of the case, then 
why does it matter if somebody restores the internals? The case is 
unchanged by doing this. The fact that the machine might well run again 
and would thus give additional information as to the state of computing 
<n> years ago would seem to be a bonus.

> > operate, repair, or maintain 50's era computers? Power requirements would

Can somebody please explain to me why it is so difficult to _learn_ these 
skills? I will admit I've enver worked on a 1950's computer (the oldest 
machine I've worked on dates from 1969 [1]), but I don't see why I'd find 
it impossible given a little bit of time to learn the tricks that were 
used then.

[1] An HP9100B. I had to start out by writing the repair manual...

> history, hopefully as such it will perpetuate the skills needed. The 

It's interesting that a small private computer history group that I 
belong to states its aims as 'preserving old computers, programs, methods 
and operating practices as far as possible'. Clearly they think (as do I) 
there's more that need to be preserved than just circuit boards :-)

-tony

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Sat May 24 18:08:44 2003

> restore the machine to the same state it left the factory most likely. Very

Not necessarily. We want to restore it to a working state. This could 
well be the state it was in when it was last used, with all the ECOs and 
user modifications left in place (assuming they're not preventing the 
machine from working, which might not be the case with some of the 
modifications I've seen made by previous owners!)

A case in point. I know a museum which has a straight-8. They are missing 
2 flip-chip cards from it. I happen to have a box full of boards pulled 
from a straight-8 (no, the chassis was not around when I got to grab the 
cards, and no I wasn't involved in pulling them). I offered said museum 
the 2 cards they needed, free of charge. They didn't want them because 
the date code stamped on the board was 2 years too late.

A few points

1) I would have had no objections to these cards being marked as 
non-origianl replacement parts, or a log being kept of what parts had 
been fitted or replaced (I would have expected that)

2) Fitting these cards would have in no way damaged the rest of the 
machine -- they could have been pulled out again to return the machine to 
its current (non-working) state

3) The machine in question was not an original obtained from DEC and 
never used. It was a machine that had been used for many years before 
being donated to the museum. What's the betting that some flip-chip cards 
were replaced while the machine was in use?

> requirements, lack of personnel that can run the machines, spare parts that

So don't run them all all the time. Run selected machines on special 
'operating days', like what's done with preserved beam engines, etc.

> could actually destroy one of the few remaining examples (or only one). Most

I doubt it would destroy the machine in the sense that it could no longer 
be used as an exhibit, or indeed that it could no longer be restored 
again. In that sense, a machine that had been restored and then failed 
during the museum demonstration is no different to a machine that's never 
been restored.

> earliest PC's that did computations via dip switch settings on the front

One reason I started restoring computers was so I could do all these 
things (FWIW, I've run a paper tape punch and reader, a card reader, 8" 
floppies, etc. I've toggled in may programs on front panel swtiches. I've 
punched a card on a 12-button hand punch, I've edditied paper tape by hand.

The equipment needed to do all those things is not particularly rare...

> have alot in common with current units. People of today can relate to how

Are you seriously implying that the internals of a fairly modern computer 
and one made, perhaps, 30 years ago are significantly different? Because 
I find them to be very similar...

> and how? There was no monitor, no keyboard, and no mouse they are totally

TO me those are peripherals, not really the computer.

> nobody who knows how to run the early mainframes in 50 years, things are

Rubbish!. Are you seriously trying to tell me that these skills can't be 
learnt? I would claim that anybody who _truely_ understood a modern 
machine would have no problems on an older one. The fact that very few 
people understand modern computers is the problem, not that the older 
machines are so different.

-tony

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Sat May 24 18:09:06 2003

> simultaneously preserving its historical fabric.  The Computer History

Exactly.

> permanent modifications to the original machine.  More information on the

I have a rule for my own collection of never making permanent 
modifications other than possibly mounting screw holes for replacement 
components. And never changing the design or architecutre (at least not 
significantly -- sometimes you have to use a differnet chip as a 
replacement, but make it emulate the part you're replacing). And, of 
course, document all replacements and changes. Yes, documentation can be 
lost or become separated from the machine, but it's better to at least 
start out with the modifications documented.

> going to explode or anything.  Worst case a chip fries or a board burns

I have _never_ had a failure that's done visible damage to the machine 
(not even burnt traces on the circuit board). If a chip fails, it looks 
the same as the chip did before it failed -- it doesn't explode, or fly 
off the circuit board. So what's to be lost by repairing and running the 
machine? If some irreplaceable part does fail, you _still_ have the 
machine as a static exhibit. And by not running it, you don't make 
buckups of firmware, etc while it's still readable, and you don't record 
important signals while the machine is still operational, so you _do_ 
lose something.

-tony

---

From: "TeoZ" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat May 24 18:53:00 2003

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tony Duell" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Sent: Saturday, May 24, 2003 6:55 PM
Subject: Re: Collection policy was Re: No space for vinatge computers in

Anything can be learned if you have the documentation of the machine in
question, and a good idea of the technology used up to the time the machine
was made. The problem I was trying to show is that the interface to the
machines has changed quite a bit, and in 50 to 100 years will probably
change quite a bit more. Put somebody that only knows a keyboard, mouse, and
supervga screen in front of a IMSAI 8080 and they wont know what to do.

---

From: Hans B Pufal <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat May 24 19:56:32 2003

TeoZ wrote:

> could actually destroy one of the few remaining examples (or only one). 

But what is destroyed? Only the functionaliity, the physical machine can 
still be used as a static display

> Most

You obviously need to visit Grenoble ;-)

> different today, how can people relate to this? 

Excellent point, this is what we need to communicate in one way or another.

> While there are still a few

Unless we make a determined effort and preserve the old trades. It is 
done in other industries, your exmaple of blacksmith is one.

Computing has, as you state, eveolved out of all recognition. The simple 
static display put on by museums do not, and cannot, present that 
evolution in any real way.

   -- hbp

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat May 24 22:19:00 2003

> supervga screen in front of a IMSAI 8080 and they wont know what to do.

But Tony's point is--and I agree--that it can be learned.
--

---

From: Philip Pemberton <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun May 25 03:55:01 2003

> it impossible given a little bit of time to learn the tricks that were 
I can't see why either - if they used valves (vacuum tubes), the tubes
should still be available NOS or used, same for the valve bases. If the
bases had been smashed, a schematic would be damn useful.
If it's transistor based, I'd just trace the circuit...

> [1] An HP9100B. I had to start out by writing the repair manual...
The oldest machine I've worked on... Hmm... That's a tough one... I guess
that would be the Jupiter Cantab "Ace" computer I'm restoring^W rebuiling.
[mental note: cover the unused connectors on the PSU with electrical tape
BEFORE powering up].
The one thing that never ceases to amaze me about the Ace is just how lousy
the tin plating on the board really is. I've touched my soldering iron to
various tracks on the board and the tin plating has come right off!
Either the flux in my roll of Multicore 60-40 solder is doing this or the
tin plating wasn't put on right. The board underneath the plating has
oxidised quite a bit... Continuity is still OK after a good cleaning, but
it's still a pig to find out that a bit of solder has separated from the
board simply because the tin plating is fubar'd.

> there's more that need to be preserved than just circuit boards :-)
Yup. I'm planning to make a backup copy of my Jupiter Ace tape and then use
the backup. One digital copy on the PC (44100Hz mono), one analog (tape)
copy. Then the fun of decoding the tape image and rebuilding the digital
data begins...
Now, if only I could get the Ace working... Is anyone here placing an order
with BGMicro in the near future? I need some more RAMs to keep as spares
for the Ace and my Cosmac Elf (DIY'd too - there's a picture of it on
www.cosmacelf.com).
That is, unless someone knows of a company in the UK that can supply 2114s
and 2101s... A CDP1861 (RCA Pixie graphics controller) would also be quite
useful... Then again, I've heard the 1861 has a pretty good reliability
record - supposedly much better than a 2114 RAM...

Later.
-- 
Phil.
[email-masked]
http://www.philpem.dsl.pipex.com/

---

From: Philip Pemberton <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun May 25 04:25:01 2003

> machines are so different.
That's more or less my opinion exactly. As long as I had at least a manual
for the CPU, I could probably sit down in front of a computer and program
it. I'd probably curse the designers or the CPU a few times, but I could
probably do it. I know basic x86 assembler (yuck), some CDP1802 assembler,
6502 assembler, C, PASCAL and (rusty) BASIC. I could sit down in front of
nearly any 1980s home computer and program it. I say "nearly any" because I
don't know FORTH, but I do intend to learn it when the Ace is up and running
again.
So the ICs are datestamped 2002. They're the same chips that were available
in 1984, the electrical characteristics have improved slightly, but the chip
itself hasn't changed that much. Wirewrap wire was available in 1984, so
were turned-pin IC sockets. Sure, mine are dated 2002, but without them it
would be a real pig to fix the machine if any of the ICs were to fail again.
So my Ace doesn't have the original ICs. It's not as if it matters. If I see
some 1984-dated 74LS chips somewhere, I'll probably buy them just for the
heck of it. To me, priority number one is getting the machine running and
keeping its exterior casing in good condition. Priority two is historical
accuracy - IC datecodes and suchlike.
I'm surprised the Ace's electrolytic capacitors are still OK!

Later.

---

From: Philip Pemberton <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun May 25 04:25:31 2003

In message <[email-masked]>

> supervga screen in front of a IMSAI 8080 and they wont know what to do.
Point taken. An average Joe Bloggs probably won't know what to do with the
IMSAI, but most programmers could skim through the manual and program the
thing in about an hour. It took me twelve minutes to get my Cosmac Elf to
accept a program and most of that was fixing a few dry joints and bad toggle
switches.

Later.

---

From: "Andy Holt" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun May 25 04:41:00 2003

> learnt? ... <below

> -tony

Well, understanding these computers in an architecture sense is one thing* -
but operating and maintenance skills were usually verbally transmitted and
rarely permanently documented. They can probably be redeveloped with
experience but this experience is likely to be at the cost of media damage.
When I was a systems programmer on an ICT1905 (then a 1905E etc) I learned
some of the skills of the operators and even occasionally helped the
engineers (usually to diagnose processor problems with "odd" symptoms)

Things like:
 the skills of handling trays of punched cards so that the readers didn't
jam - and the practice of clearing the jams that did happen. (a 1600 cpm
reader can fling cards all over the place when it feels like it! - the 600
cpm reader was referred-to as "the mangler" by anyone who used it ... and
with good reason)
 loading magnetic tape drives - the upright ones with vacuum columns (yeah,
it's trivial ... not!)
 handling "washing-machine" exchangeable disk packs
 ensuring fanfold paper stacks correctly from a fast line-printer
 having the reactions to hit the stop button on that printer when it starts
page-throwing at maximum speed.
 recognising the progress of jobs from the sound of the console loudspeaker

 knowing which boards to tap (and how hard) when doing "preventative
maintenance" listening to that loudspeaker while running the diagnostics
programs (and those programs were probably the very first things to get
thrown out when the computer was replaced)
 switching things on (and off) in the correct order (and how to start the MG
set)
 even the bootstrap sequence wasn't as simple as on a PDP-11

>      I would claim that anybody who _truely_ understood a modern

I would put this the other way round - people who had a good understanding
of the old machines have some chance of getting a deep understanding of
modern ones. In terms of the Instruction Set Architecture and programming
there are few difficulties in understanding one given the other (but for
'minor' things like self-modifying code and the concept of overlays). On the
other hand, the lower level descriptions of the processor logic typically
use terminology that is totally foreign to the modern logic designer - not
to mention the implicit "wired-or" that is frequently used and not
explicitly mentioned in the documentation or that with only a small number
of logic gates per card techniques were used to minimise the number of gates
that would never be seen on modern synchronous logic.

Andy

---

From: Tim <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun May 25 06:19:00 2003

I'd have to agree with Andy - up to a point.  My aunt was senior 
programmer at Harrow borough council for years.  I'm 46 now, but when I 
was 11, I remember my aunt discussing with my grandfather, the 
decommissioning of the computer that the had become so familiar with. 
 From memory it was an English Electric Co.  "LEO" (Lyons Electronic 
Office) machine, I think mostly built from vacuum tubes/valves, and 
dependent on card punches and readers for much of it's input.  I 
remember seeing guys in white coats tending the machine in its less 
effective moments, and the general air of respect and authority they 
commanded from the programmers and operators.  About 10 years later, I 
got my first job in the industry as a field engineer for Data General. 
I remember I spent some time explaining to my aunt how I'd written a 
simple disk subsystem diagnostic which I'd keyed in through a 'virtual 
console' in hex.  I then had to explain to her what a virtual console 
was, followed by an explanation of why parts of the machines she knew 
so well had to be re-wired as part of the programming process.

The aim of a business is to make money - and most would agree that 
homo-sapiens is essentially a lazy creature (at least, I am)!  In terms 
of hardware and software design and production, this means more and 
more layers of abstraction between the basic computational structures 
and the functions that users desire.  Doesn't it seem like a natural 
progression then, that not only do fewer and fewer people understand 
less and less about machine and system architecture, but given 
sufficient time, the nature of the IO devices and operations has/is 
becoming so different from the earliest systems, that it is becoming a 
non-trivial task to understand even their function, let alone their 
correct modus operandi (e.g. how many hardware engineers today would 
recognise, let alone understand the detail in the design of a mercury 
delay line)?

It seems to me that there is nothing at all wrong with this, its just 
that times/fashions change, and so do our reasons for doing things. On 
the other hand, the reasons given by the perpetrators of software bloat 
and the apparently unconnected increasing hardware complexity that 
always seems to accompany it (I'd often prefer the term sophistry) are 
highly suspect.......

Tim

---

From: ben franchuk <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun May 25 10:07:01 2003

Tim wrote:

> of hardware and software design and production, this means more and more 
> layers of abstraction between the basic computational structures and the 
> functions that users desire.  Doesn't it seem like a natural progression 
> then, that not only do fewer and fewer people understand less and less 
> about machine and system architecture, but given sufficient time, the 
> nature of the IO devices and operations has/is becoming so different 
> from the earliest systems, that it is becoming a non-trivial task to 
> understand even their function, let alone their correct modus operandi 
> (e.g. how many hardware engineers today would recognise, let alone 
> understand the detail in the design of a mercury delay line)?
>
Forget  that delay line ... I want a comparsion chart of the latest
DVD players. A schematic too EVEN!  Right now I am looking for a
mid-priced player with good audio out , not some 39 cent part for audio.
This is true of computers, I want to know just what I buying!
Ben.

---

From: "TeoZ" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun May 25 10:23:00 2003

Thats another point, miniturization and design optimization. Today there are
chips that do what a whole box of chips did before. Older machines had a
seperate circuit for each function, and were easier to follow what was going
on. Newer equipment just has a data in and final product out and nobody
knows how it does anything inside because it is proprietary and you dont get
schematics. Also techs coming out of school today troublshoot a product to a
circuit board and swap that out (usually there is only 1 board in the whole
device), unlike in years past where they had the knowledge to find and
repair any problem using the schematics that were easy to obtain. Everything
in computing today (except maybe some embedded designs) are built using
tools that use preprogrammed routines that are many layers away from the
actual hardware. I know quite a few programmers today who have no clue how
their hardware operates, I know nobody that started programming on the C64
that didnt have a good understanding of the hardware they used.

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Sun May 25 16:09:00 2003

> still be used as a static display

Agreed. It's almost unheard-of for a machine to catch fire, or for 
components to physically explode while just in use...

However, I would add that the _first_ time a machine is powered up after 
not being run for some time, you need to take things slowly and 
carefully. As in checking the PSUs on dummy load (this has saved me many 
hours of hunting for difficult-to-find chips!), checking for shorts 
between power rails, and so on. NEVER just apply power to an unknown 
machine unless you have much better luck than me :-)

Also, as has been mentioned here in the past, make (and keep) backups of 
all ROMs, PALs, etc. It is entirely possible that components will fail 
when the machine is in use, and it's a good idea to make it as easy to 
replace them as possible (it's easier to burn an image into an EPROM than 
to first have to hunt for somebody with the same model of machine :-))

-tony

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Sun May 25 16:09:43 2003

> was made. The problem I was trying to show is that the interface to the

THis is surely a good argument for keeping all such documentation. Not 
just the user and service manuals for the machine in question, but also 
general books on electronics from that time period, component data books, 
even component catalogues. 

I doubt any here will disagree with doing that! (even if some museums 
don't see the point...)

> supervga screen in front of a IMSAI 8080 and they wont know what to do.

And a static display will _not_ demonstrate the user interface. It's one 
thing to just see a panel with a row of switches on it -- you don't learn 
much from that. It's quite another to see the panel in use, with the 
lights blinking, and being able to look at memory locations, start 
programs running, examine registers, and so on.

-tony

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Sun May 25 16:10:28 2003

> rarely permanently documented. They can probably be redeveloped with

True, and even if they were documented, that's often not enough. You need 
to have a 'feel' for the machine, or more exactly, you need to have done 
it before.

> experience but this experience is likely to be at the cost of media damage.

One reason to always start with unimportant media...

Yes, I know that blank media for some drives -- particularly demountable 
hard disks -- is difficult to find and expensive. But unless people do 
continue learning how to run and maintain such drives, then knowledge and 
skills will be lost for ever. To me, ensuring there's still one person in 
the world who has aligned an RK05 from scratch was worth risking a disk 
pack for...

> modern ones. In terms of the Instruction Set Architecture and programming

It makes no difference which way round you say it. If you _truely_ 
understand a modern machine, then you'll find the older ones pretty easy 
to understand. Conversely, understanding an older machine will help you 
understand modern ones.

> that would never be seen on modern synchronous logic.

The less said about so-called designers who have problems with any of 
that, the better!

-tony

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Sun May 25 16:10:51 2003

> bases had been smashed, a schematic would be damn useful.

Even then you'd not be totally lost without a schematic if you knew the 
type of valve that was supposed to go there (quite likely to be a double 
triode, actually). The heater connections should be darn obvious, and you 
can easily distinguish grid from anode from cathode with a little 
practice. The only problem would be keeping the right anode/grid/cathode 
together.

I suspect if the holder was broken into a fairly small number of pieces 
you could fit them back together well enough to work out which pin was which.

Anway, can somebody please tell me how running a machine (as opposed to 
having it on statick display) is going to cause valve holders to break in 
half?

> that would be the Jupiter Cantab "Ace" computer I'm restoring^W rebuiling.

Oh, a relatively new machine (must be, it's got one of those new-fangled 
microprocessors [1] in it) :-)

[1] As opposed to an old-fashioned microprocessor, meaning a sequencer 
running microcode. Both DEC and HP used the word in this sense in the 1970s.

-tony

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Sun May 25 16:12:01 2003

> probably do it. I know basic x86 assembler (yuck), some CDP1802 assembler,

Well, I don't claim to be a programmer, and I've never used an Altair or 
an Imsai, but I'll make the following claim. Put me in front of either 
machine with the standard documentation, and I am _sure_ I could figure 
out how to use it.

> don't know FORTH, but I do intend to learn it when the Ace is up and running

: GREETING ." Hello World !"  CR ;

:-)

Forth is one of my favoruite languages for quick hacks, but then I like 
RPN systems in general. It took me an afternoon to learn enough Forth to 
be dangerous :-)

> accuracy - IC datecodes and suchlike.

Me too. I'll do reversable kludges, like sticking an IC to the PCB and 
wiring it in with wire-wrap wire, dead-bug style if I can't get the 
original part and need to make up a replacement. It can always be ripped 
out and replaced by the right chip if I do find one.

> I'm surprised the Ace's electrolytic capacitors are still OK!

WHy? I don't find electrolytics to be a major problem in classic 
computers (unlike in more modern SMPSUs and monitors...)

-tony

---

From: Philip Pemberton <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon May 26 02:54:00 2003

> practice. The only problem would be keeping the right anode/grid/cathode 
I'm not that good with vacuum tube circuitry, but if the computer is based
on digital logic or microprocessor technology and the parts are available,
I'd at least have a go at fixing it. Now I've developed a trick for getting
the parts that are to be replaced out of the PCB without FUBARing it...

> having it on statick display) is going to cause valve holders to break in 
Valve overheats, base was (hypothetically) made of crappy materials, base
cracks, then the heat of the valve cracks it in half or whatever.
Highly unlikely, but not outside the realms of possibility. Then again, it
could have occured during shipping...

> microprocessors [1] in it) :-)
:-)
I'm more interested in collecting old home computers. I have been known to
break that rule once or twice, though.

> running microcode. Both DEC and HP used the word in this sense in the 1970s.
Didn't I mention that I was planning to buy some LS logic chips and build my
own CPU?
Then again, I might just cheat and buy an FPGA...

Later.

---

From: Philip Pemberton <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon May 26 03:04:02 2003

> machine with the standard documentation, and I am _sure_ I could figure 
Same here. Give me the machine and the documentation and I'll most likely be
able to do the same.

> : GREETING ." Hello World !"  CR ;
Aargh! Another FORTH coder :-)

> RPN systems in general. It took me an afternoon to learn enough Forth to 
In which case, it'll probably take me about a week when the Ace is up and
running. Like I said, this time I'm going to buy a power supply and cut off
all the unused connectors. That should reduce the probability of another
catastrophic failure..

> computers (unlike in more modern SMPSUs and monitors...)
Well, that's true. I've seen two year old computers with faulty capacitors,
yet my ZX Spectrum +2A (anyone got a spare disc controller?) still works
fine. I used to have the lightgun and the "James Bond Games Pack" (IIRC),
but that bit the dust when my 14" TV landed on top of the tape box and
lightgun. Cause? A former friend who couldn't accept that he couldn't get
past level 1 on "Operation Wolf"... Hmm... With friends like that, who needs
enemies?

Later.

---

From: Ethan Dicks <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon May 26 08:01:00 2003

--- Philip Pemberton <[email-masked]> wrote:
> fine.

There was a story a few months to a year back about bad Taiwanese
electrolytic caps pervading the market - it seems that someone stole
*half* of a secret electrolytic formula from Japan.  Millions of
defective caps made it into the marketplace.  They outgas and rupture.
Symptoms include distended pressure relief plates (the cross on the
top of some packages) or extruding the rubber plug out of the body of
the cap.  I've seen motherboards with 80% of the caps visibly failed.

Two year old equipment falls into the window of when the defective
caps were being sold.

Yes, really old caps might need to be reformed, but five year old caps
are more likely to last five more years (or more) than two year old caps
are to last another two years.

-ethan
The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo.
http://search.yahoo.com

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Mon May 26 17:30:00 2003

> I'd at least have a go at fixing it. Now I've developed a trick for getting

I'll go further than that -- I'd have a go at fixing just about anything. 
Being able to get the right spares and having the original schematics and 
service manuals helps, but it is not essential (as I have proved many 
times :-))

> the parts that are to be replaced out of the PCB without FUBARing it...

The best way I've found for pin-through-hole DIPs is to suck off all the 
solder I can with a good solder sucker [1], and then to press the leads 
inwards towards the body of the chip on the component side to break the 
remaing bit of solder. The chip then comes out without damage. 

[1] A smear of petroleum jelly (vaseline, etc) on the O-ring of a solder 
sucker really improves it!

> cracks, then the heat of the valve cracks it in half or whatever.

I have _never_ seen this happen, and I run a lot of valved equipment still..

Anyway, if this happened, I suspect you'd still be able to see how the 
parts should fit together, and thus would be able to record which wires 
went to each pin. 

-tony

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Mon May 26 17:31:29 2003

> Aargh! Another FORTH coder :-)

Of course... Here's a _very_ brief introduction to Forth.

Forth consists of 'words' sepeared by whitespace. When the Forth system 
reads your command line, it looks up each word in its 'dictionary'. If it 
can find it, it executes it. If not, it attempts to translate the 
sequence of characters as a number in the current base. If that fails 
too, it gives an error message.

Forth arithmetic is done using reverse polish notation (it virtually has 
to be using that method of esecution), and is often integer only. 

So, when you get your Forth system running, type something like 

2 3 +

(the spaces are, of course important, although you can type more than 1 
if you like). This pushs 2 on the stack (the first thing was not found in 
the dictionary, so was taken as a numbner [1]), then pushes 3, then 
executes the word '+' when pops 2 numbers off the stack ans pushes the 
sum. The stack now contains 5.

[1] OK, experienced Forth hackers will realise I've simplified things 
here. It's common to have small numbers (generally -1, 0, 1, 2, 3 and 
maybe others) defined as words in the dictionary so as to speed up 
execution. These words just push the obvious value onto the stack when 
executed. But there's no reason to have these defined -- the system can 
run without them.

But you can't see it. The forth word . (that's a single period, and is 
pronounced 'dot') pops the top of stack and displays it as a number in 
the currnet base. Try it. You should get '5' displayed somewhere. The 
stack is now empty.

So far it's just an integer-only calculator. What makes Forth interesting 
is that you can add your own words to the dictionary (in fact that's how 
you generally program in Forth, you just keep on defining new words). 
There are sevveral ways to do this, the simplest is the 'colon 
definition'. This defines a new word (immediately following a colon) in 
terms of existing words. The definition is ended by a semicolon.

OK, let's try that 

: SQ DUP * ;

This defines a new word called 'SQ' (for 'square') as being the same as 
DUP *. That means duplicate the number on top of stack, then multiply the 
2 numbers on the stack. This, of course, multiplies the top of stack by 
itself (a reasonable way to square it :-)).

OK, yuou can now try out the new definition

4 SQ .

(don't forget the 'dot') should display 16

Or 4 SQ 3 SQ + .

should display 25

Note you can use 'home made' words just like the ones in the system. You 
can even use them in new definitions, e.g. 

; 4TH-POWER SQ SQ ;

Obviously there's a lot more to the language than that (loops, 
conditionals, etc), but that should be a start.

-tony

---

From: Hans B Pufal <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 27 07:01:00 2003

> were replaced while the machine was in use?

Did you suggest that they check the date code on all the other cards ;-)

> during the museum demonstration is no different to a machine that's never 

An makes the demonstration closer to real life when machines DID break 
down. I even imagine demonstrations of engineers fixing and testing the 
machines, a regular occurrence. Today you simply go aout an buy a new 
one :-(

> I find them to be very similar...

They ARE entiely the same, the difference is that to see that 
resemblance you need to run the machine. The museum s stance of showing 
only statc display accentuates only the differences without explaining 
the similarities.

> machines are so different.

Precisely! and I see the older machines as offering a path towards 
better understanding.

   -- hbp

---

From: Hans B Pufal <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 27 07:01:58 2003

> and apply the same policies to all objects.

And worse to the categorisation and descritpion. We are in the process 
of inventorying our collection, the PDP-9 is described as "a cabinet xx 
cm tall, xx cm wide, xx cm deep with orange and black panels and an 
operator console". That neatly describes a museums view of a PDP-9 !!
I am currently in a battle royal to get this point of view chamged.

> it impossible given a little bit of time to learn the tricks that were 

After all the folks in the 60's learnt their tricks from those that 
worked in the 50's!

> there's more that need to be preserved than just circuit boards :-)

An entirely rightly so!!!

I recently recoverd an entire PDP-9 OS thought long lost from three 
DECtapes found in a batch of over 100. Had "policy" been applied at 
least 90 of those tapes would have been trashed on the grounds that "we 
already have ten of those".

   -- hbp

---

From: Hans B Pufal <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 27 07:02:21 2003

TeoZ wrote:

> Put somebody that only knows a keyboard, mouse, and

No, but they can learn. I do EXACTLY that with a PDP-8/e cpu I drag 
around to show at school exhibitions. The first question I get, of 
course, is where is the screen and keyboard. I teach the kids binary, 
than, with the aid of a small program left in the core we calculate the 
mean of a sequence of numbers entered in binary. And not a screen or 
keybaord in sight. This demo ALWAYS gets good reviews....

This reminds me ao another story. I was talking with a young colleague a 
few years ago, e must have been in his early twenties. We were talking 
about old machines and his main question was : "How DID you use thos old 
machine without screens and keyboards?". And this from a software engineer!

   -- hbp

---

From: Mail List <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 27 08:59:00 2003

Hans,

That is interesting. What school do you teach at? I used to teach college 
accredited
courses in CAD/CAM and CNC Machine Programming, Set Up, and Operation to the
US Navy until the contract ran out. I also had to teach basic trig, and 
basic computer
operation skills, etc. as part of the course, because the students had 
virtually zero
background in the subject arena. All in three weeks for the CAD/CAM and 
five weeks
for the CNC courses too. It was a shame that they didn't do any preliminary 
training
because it was so much to cover in so short a time, especially since 
training time was
often interrupted by shipboard drills, GQ ( General Quarters ), REFTRA ( 
Refresher
Training ), and other naval requirements, ie. gun shoot training, trips to 
medical, shop
or shipboard picnics, etc.

Best Regards

At 07:15 AM 5/25/03 +0200, you wrote:
>No, but they can learn. I do EXACTLY that with a PDP-8/e cpu I drag around 
>to show at school exhibitions. The first question I get, of course, is 
>where is the screen and keyboard. I teach the kids binary, than, with the 
>aid of a small program left in the core we calculate the mean of a 
>sequence of numbers entered in binary. And not a screen or keybaord in 
>sight. This demo ALWAYS gets good reviews....
>

---

From: Peter Turnbull <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue May 27 12:46:43 2003

> keybaord in sight. This demo ALWAYS gets good reviews....

Exactly what I did with my 8-year-old niece at Christmas.  She's really
into "sums" and arithmetic at the moment, so when I wanted to play with
my 8/E, I taught her a little about binary, showed her how to read
octal off the switches and lights, and we added some numbers.  She
loved it.

-- 
Pete						Peter Turnbull
						Network Manager
						University of York

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Tue May 27 18:01:00 2003

> Did you suggest that they check the date code on all the other cards ;-)

NO, I gave up with them, and decided I'd rather give these flip-chips to 
people who actually _wanted_ them :-).

> down. I even imagine demonstrations of engineers fixing and testing the 

Have you tried doing fault-tracing when there are clueless people 
watching you, and asking why you're doing what you're doing? I tried it a 
few times. It was OK on obvious faults when you know what to check, etc, 
but downright painful on anything obscure.

> machines, a regular occurrence. Today you simply go aout an buy a new 

Well, you might, but I certainly don't. Component-level repair is alive 
and well round here...

> Precisely! and I see the older machines as offering a path towards 

Perhaps that's why modern machines don't worry me too much. Or actually, 
it's why they _do_ worry me. I want to diagnose and repair them like I 
repair my PDPs, but alas I can't get the neceessary information and parts 
to do so. Oh well...

Still, becasue I learnt to fix PDP11s (after I learnt to fix the P850..), 
there's not much digital stuff around the frightens me...

-tony

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Tue May 27 18:01:58 2003

> I am currently in a battle royal to get this point of view chamged.

Argh!! I knew I disliked most museums for a good reason :-)... This is 
simply rediculous. A PDP9 is a PDP9 no matter what cabinet it's installed 
in, of even if it's jsut loose backplanes and PSUs...

Mind you, I once saw a list of valves (vacuum tubes) that one museum was 
offering to another. The list had a column of 'condition'. No, it didn't 
give the emission and gm figures. It didn't even say if the heater was 
continous, and the getter silver (not white, which would indicate air had 
leaked into the valve). No, it described how clean the glass was... 

> already have ten of those".

The obvious extension of this is that art galleries should throw out all 
but 10 of their paintains on the ground that they 'already have 10 pieces 
of canvas with paint on them' :-)... And that libraries only need to keep 
10 books ('we already have 10 sets of bound pieces of paper with ink on 
them').

Somebody is going to have to educate museum curators about the importance 
and meaning of technical and computer artefacts...

-tony

---

From: Hans Pufal <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed May 28 01:16:42 2003

>>than, with the aid of a small program left in the core we calculate
>> the mean of a sequence of numbers entered in binary. And not a screen
 >> or keyboard in sight. This demo ALWAYS gets good reviews....

> octal off the switches and lights, and we added some numbers.  She

And so did you I'm sure. I sometimes wonder who gets the most out of 
these demos, the domonstrators or the demontratees - definitly a win-win 
situation.

   -- hbp

---

From: Hans Pufal <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed May 28 14:19:01 2003

> in, of even if it's jsut loose backplanes and PSUs...

Exactly...

> leaked into the valve). No, it described how clean the glass was... 

Yes, exactly the same mentality.

>> Had "policy" been applied at least 90 of those tapes would have
 >> been trashed on the grounds that "we already have ten of those".

> but 10 of their paintings on the ground that they 'already have 10 pieces 

> and meaning of technical and computer artefacts...

Indeed, and the battle will be long and arduous...

But we WILL prevail....

   -- hbp

---

From: "brian roth" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu May 29 12:25:01 2003

John has been making these for years.

Try this link. http://www.dbit.com/fdadap.html

Brian.

Brian Roth
Network Administrator
A+  N+  CNA  CCNA
Network Services
First Niagara Bank
(716) 625-7500 X2186
[email-masked]

>>> [email-masked] 05/29/03 12:48PM >>>
> That way those of us with
> an 8" hooked to a PC could make 8" disks.
>

How do you do this? I am interested.

What floppy controller do you use? I am assuming it is for the ISA bus?
Anything for a PCI bus.

Anything for EISA, I am keeping one EISA bus system.

Paxton
Astoria, OR

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---

From: "Jerome H. Fine" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu May 29 13:28:00 2003

>brian roth wrote:

> Anything for EISA, I am keeping one EISA bus system.

Jerome Fine replies:

What might have been missed during this exchange is that
for 8" floppy media, DEC had two densities.

The DEC RX01 had the same identical format as the IBM
8" floppy.  The RX01 held 494 blocks of 512 bytes each.
As far as I know, there were 4 sectors per block of 128 bytes
each.

That is what John's board at dbit handles - again as far
as I know.

DEC also used a drive call an RX02.  Those media
contained 988 blocks of 512 bytes each per 8" floppy.
It is possible to switch between the two densities using
a DEC RX02 drive which can read BOTH.  But the
DEC RX01 drive can read only floppy media that have
494 blocks of 512 bytes each.

John, if you are reading this, it would be best if you could
confirm - also even better if you could explain why they
hardware to read the DEC  RX02 8" floppy media is
not available on a PC.

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine
--
If you attempted to send a reply and the original e-mail
address has been discontinued due a high volume of junk
e-mail, then the semi-permanent e-mail address can be
obtained by replacing the four characters preceding the
'at' with the four digits of the current year.

---

From: "Jerome H. Fine" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu May 29 16:13:00 2003

Jerome Fine replies:

With my grandchildren, I discovered a way to make binary
numbers interesting.  We started with the concept that each
finger represented a ZERO or a power of two.

All fingers down was ZERO.

Baby Finger UP was ONE.

Ruby Ring UP was TWO

Both Baby Finger and Ruby Ring was THREE.

Tobby Tall UP (by itself) was FOUR

Tobby Tall and Baby Finger was FIVE

Tobby Tall and Ruby Ring was SIX

Tobby Tall and Ruby Ring and Baby Finger was SEVEN

Peter Pointer (by itself) was EIGHT

Peter Pointer and Baby Finger was ...

We rarely got beyond this point since everyone was
laughing so much by then, by it made the game a lot of
fun.

If they were able to grasp the meaning of powers of two
and get to EIGHT, then they already knew what having
Peter Pointer and Baby Finger were supposed to mean!

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine

---

From: Peter Turnbull <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu May 29 20:02:01 2003

> Both Baby Finger and Ruby Ring was THREE.

Very good!  I've seen a similar proposal written by Fred Pohl in a book
called "Digits and Dastards".  The last two items in this collection
(of mostly SF short stories) are entitled "How To Count On Your
Fingers" and "On Binary digits and Human Habits" (copyright 1856 and
1962 respectively!).

-- 
Pete						Peter Turnbull
						Network Manager
						University of York

---

From: "Fred Cisin (XenoSoft)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu May 29 20:23:01 2003

> > Both Baby Finger and Ruby Ring was THREE.

... and for some reason some people get upset when you get to four

---

From: Jochen Kunz <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri May 30 07:16:00 2003

> hardware to read the DEC  RX02 8" floppy media is
I am not John, but this may be the explanation:
The RX02 uses double density only for the data inside the sector. The
sector header is (mostly) the same as a RX01 sector header and it is
rcorded in single density. Result: A RX01 holds 128 Bytes per sector, a
RX02 holds 256 bytes per sector, thus doubling the capacity. So the
floppy controller has to switch the data rate from sector header to
sector data... A really, uhhm, "interresting" design. 
-- 

tschüß,
       Jochen

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

---

From: "Jerome H. Fine" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri May 30 08:09:00 2003

>Jochen Kunz wrote:

Jerome Fine replies:

YES!!!

So when under the command in RT-11:
FORMAT  DY0:/SINGLE
all that happens is that the density bit in the sector header is set
to "Single Density", but a complete LLF (Low Level Format)
is not done, in fact can't be done, using a DEC  RX02 drive.
Likewise, the RT-11 command:
FORMAT  DY0:/DOUBLE   (the default)
sets the density bit in the sector header to "Double Density"
and again can't be done with a DEC  RX02 unless the floppy
media is already LLF.

On the other hand, in my experience, in some cases the floppy
media can be "somewhat" damaged.  Under some circumstances,
is is possible to use the RT-11  FORMAT command to restore
those bad sectors so that they function correctly.  Of course,
if the LLF is totally wiped out for any given sector, I guess that
nothing can be done.  Warning - if the FORMAT command
is used, all current information on the floppy is destroyed - save
anything that is still useful BEFORE the FORMAT command.

NOTE that most 3rd party RX01/RX02 controller/drive pairs
for DEC  PDP-11 hardware were able to do the complete
LLF for RX01/RX02 media.  In fact, I seem to remember that
the controller was not required - the drive contained the ability
to do a LLF off-line.  This was not the RT-11  FORMAT
command, but a complete LLF.

The same situation occurred with the DEC  RX50 floppy media.
The DEC  RX50 drive could NOT perform an LLF.

However, by the time that DEC allowed the RX33 on the RQDX3,
DEC had switched to industry standard HD  PC  1.2  MByte floppy
drives and media with 2400 blocks.  The first time I used RT-11
to perform a FORMAT command on an industry standard
UNFORMATTED  PC  HD  1.2  MByte floppy, AND  IT
WORKED, I think I almost fainted I was so shocked.

The question that is still unanswered is IF the board that dbit
has available that supports the RX01 floppy media on a PC
with the appropriate 8" floppy drive CAN  ALSO support
an RX02 media?   I seem to remember that the answer is NO!

But perhaps John can confirm this answer?

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine

---

From: Ethan Dicks <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri May 30 08:17:00 2003

> sector data... A really, uhhm, "interresting" design. 

That is, essentially, the case.  A DEC drive can take an IBM-formatted
floppy (RX01 format) and scribble the right things on it to make it an
RX02 floppy, but only third-party drives (Data Systems Designs, et al.)
can start with a blank floppy.  Unlike "modern" machines, there is no
"floppy chip" in an RX01 or RX02 drive - it's all done with TTL,
PROMs and discrete components.  When floppy controller chips became
popular, they didn't spend a lot of time on "oddball" formats.

The data-portion of the RX02 is what a PeeCee FDC can't digest.  It
*might* be possible to program an Amiga to digest RX02 disks (it also
lacks a dedicated FDC - it uses a 4096-bit shift register in the sound
chip to import the data, and (for MFM formats) miniterms applied by
the graphics co-processor to translate back and forth to plain binary
data).  The Catweasel should be able to handle it, but, as has been
hashed out here before, you'd have to roll your own with it; the software
support is severely lacking compared to the capability of the hardware.

-ethan

---

From: Peter Turnbull <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri May 30 13:10:00 2003

On May 30,  9:08, Jerome H. Fine wrote:
> > rcorded in single density.

> command, but a complete LLF.

No, that's backwards.  In the case of DEC RX01 or RX02 with a DEC
controller, the controller card (in the QBus or Unibus) is fairly dumb,
it's just an interface.  The "smart" stuff is in the drive enclosure.
 The controller passes a FORMAT command to the drive, the drive
chunters away and executs it, and reports back to the controller when
it's done.

In the case of third-party controllers with "industry standard" drives,
the controller is "smart" and the drive is dumb.  The controller does
the formatting, and sends control signals and a data/clock bitstream to
the drive, so you can't do anything

> The DEC  RX50 drive could NOT perform an LLF.

It works differently than an RX01/RX02.  In fact it works exactly like
the third-party RX01/RX02 case above, except that DEC saw fit not to
include formatting routines in the RQDX1/RQDX2 controller.  The RX50
drive is an oddly-engineered variant of an industry-standard 5.25" dual
floppy, with almost exactly the same control/data signals.

> drives and media with 2400 blocks.

Yes, the RQDX3 includes firmware that can do the formatting.  However
the layout it creates is fixed, and not useful for an RX50 (which has
almost exactly the same hardware interface as an RX33).

> an RX02 media?   I seem to remember that the answer is NO!

Correct.  The answer is "no", for exactly the reason Jochen describes,
and indeed John's webpage says so.

-- 
Pete						Peter Turnbull
						Network Manager
						University of York

---

From: Megan <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri May 30 14:18:00 2003

>and again can't be done with a DEC  RX02 unless the floppy

If you have a DSD disk unit with a floppy, that will truly
format the floppy.  The only disk drive/system from DEC
which could format a floppy is the PDT-11/150 (!)

This was discussed at some length on a DEC-interal mailing
list following the sale of PDTs to employees.  It turns out
that the PDT writes all the formatting info for any track it
writes, so if you write to the entire disk, it will be
formatted single density.

You can then take the disk to another drive (RX02) and change
the density to double.

At one point when I had an office on ML5-5 at DEC, I had a
floppy which was held to a filing cabinet by a large disk
magnet.  When people wanted proof, I would take it down and
demonstrate it as being unreadable, then would format it in
a PDT-11/150 I had, and then proceed to use it...

>The DEC  RX50 drive could NOT perform an LLF.

There was, however, a ROM which was available (at least I had
one at one point) which allowed formatting of RX50 media on
a PRO series machine...

					Megan

---

From: "Jerome H. Fine" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri May 30 16:17:01 2003

>Megan wrote:

Jerome Fine replies:

I have an DSD unit with a floppy (DSD 880/30) and have
performed an LLF on an RX02 media.

But I did not know that the PDT-11/150 was also able to
do an LLF as well.  Thank you!

However, does the PDT-11/150 use an actual DEC  RX01
floppy drive or something a bit different?  With the answer
to this question, it should be possible to determine if the
RX01 has some of the smarts to do an LLF, but when
connected to a Qbus RX01 controller, the combination
is not capable - OR DEC did not make public the command
codes to cause the RX01 drive to do an LLF?

> formatted single density.

Please confirm that the PDT-11/150 uses ONLY  RX01 media.

ALSO,  is the device driver for the PDT-11/150 the PD.SYS
file?  I seem to remember that the PDT-11/150 did NOT have
a hard drive, is that true?  If the PDT-11/150 does have a
hard drive, which hard drive and what is the name of the file
for the device driver?

> You can then take the disk to another drive (RX02) and change

That was the essence of my reply above with the two different
commands under RT-11 using a DEC  RX02 floppy drive.

What would be helpful is is you would confirm (or deny - since
I am always making mistakes) that the FORMAT command
under RT-11 for 8" floppy media on a Qbus/Unibus system
ONLY sets the density bit in the sector header of the media.
BUT, before that can be done, a successful LLF must occur
with that media.

The DSD 3rd party floppy drives were one method.

You have confirmed that a PDT-11/150 is a second method.

> a PDT-11/150 I had, and then proceed to use it...

While I have no doubt that the PDT-11/150 can do an LLF
on an 8" floppy media and your demonstration was evidence
of that fact, I do not agree that it was proof.  I have, on many
occasions, had an 8" floppy which I could not read on a
DEC  RX02.  It had already had an LLF, but all attempts
to read the media were unsuccessful or unreadable.  On a
Qbus PDP-11/23 with a DEC  RX02 drive, I used the
RT-11 command:

FORMAT  DY0:

and it was successful and I could again read the 8" media.

So while the magnet would likely do a bulk erase, it is not
proof that it was done and that an LLF was required -  yes
99.9% of the time I would agree it would be necessary, but
very rarely it might not.

> one at one point) which allowed formatting of RX50 media on

You mentioned that a few years ago.  Did the LLF process
use the RT-11 command or was XXDP used?  Since I
can't remember if XXDP ran on a PRO350, I am curious.

Also, I just remembered that a Rainbow could also do an LLF
on an RX50?????????????

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine

---

From: Martin Scott Goldberg <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Jun 1 02:12:00 2003

Thanks to the Milwaukee Computer Society, MIDI Maze on the Atari ST will
be returning as a computer display for the first time in 14 years.  For
those not familiar, MIDI Maze was the first networked
personal computer game (using the ST series' built in MIDI ports).  It's a
fast paced action first person shooter maze game that links a network of
up to 15 Atari ST computers through their built in MIDI ports. The Midwest
Classic will have 10 Atari ST computers linked up for the game, and for a
small fee, visitors will be able to play against each other and experience
the fun! MIDI Maze was originaly released by Hybrid Arts at the Winter
1987 Consumer Electronics Show. Over a dozen ST's were hooked together at
the Atari display, and a floating MIDI Maze game ran continously
throughout the days of the show.  Players move their character, a large
smiley face around the maze in search of the other players. MIDI Maze was
the true introduction of the networked First Person Shooter, and helped to
inspire games like Wolfenstein 3D and DOOM. The Atari user group Milatari
use to host the MIDI Maze event at Milwaukee hosted GenCon roleplaying
gaming event in the late 80's, and hundreds of attendees would
participate. GenCon may have moved to Indiana last year, but MIDI Maze is
staying right here making an appearance after all these years at the
Midwest Classic.  www.midwestclassic.net for more info, or contact me if
you're in the Milwaukee/Chicago area and interested in setting up a
display of your own.

Marty

---

From: Ethan Dicks <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Jun 1 16:42:00 2003

--- Martin Scott Goldberg <[email-masked]> wrote:
> personal computer game (using the ST series' built in MIDI ports).

There was a game for the PET that linked user ports that was available
years before the ST came out.  It was well documented in Byte magazine.
I never bought it because I had only one PET.  Each player had a fixed
base and a roving tank.  The goal of the game was to lob an ICBM on
the other player's base.  You located it by exploring with the tank.
I cannot recall the name at the moment, but it's come up for discussion
on the list before.

Beware making "first" claims.  There's frequently an antecedent.

-ethan

---

From: "Fred Cisin (XenoSoft)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Jun 1 16:53:00 2003

> personal computer game (using the ST series' built in MIDI ports).

Are you saying that there did not exist ANY networked personal computer
games until the time of the Atari ST?

FAQ: First?
ANY time that anybody announces ANYTHING as being "first", others can find
examples of prior art.

Although none were ever significant commercial successes, there were
networked personal computer games on the TRS-80 (MODEL 1), Sony SMC-70,
and probably MANY others.

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Jun 1 20:54:00 2003

> I cannot recall the name at the moment, but it's come up for discussion

Flash Attack!

Thanks to help from Larry Anderson, I got a game running for a demo I put
together a few years ago.  It was actually pretty cool.

> Beware making "first" claims.  There's frequently an antecedent.

Indeed.  Even Flash Attack! was a copy of a TRS-80 game that came out a
few years earlier called "Combat" (not to be confused with the Atari 2600
game).

But I think the "first" claim he is making is with regards to more than 2
nodes which, if you define "personal computer" broadly enough, would
easily cover the computers that were used to play the original MazeWar
(mainly Imlacs and Altos, plus some DEC graphics terminals).

--

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Jun 1 20:58:00 2003

> and probably MANY others.

Another one is TelePong on the Apple ][.  It was one of their very early
software releases and came with their original serial card.  It allowed
you to hook two Apple ]['s together through either a null modem or a modem
connection and play Pong against a remote opponent.

I plan to exhibit this at a VCF some year.  Maybe this one.  Hmmm, a good
theme for this year's VCF would be "Networked Computer Games through the
Ages".

Hmmm...

--

---

From: [email-masked] (Sean 'Captain Napalm' Conner)
Date: Sun Jun 1 23:17:00 2003

> I cannot recall the name at the moment, but it's come up for discussion

  I thought of that as well (it was the December 1980 issue of Byte by the
way, and later one it became Flash Attack available on the MajorBBS)
but I discountd that as I thought it used the serial port to hook only two
machines together; technically that may make it a "network" but not in the
general sense of the word (multiple machines).

  The article itself was written by Tim Striker and someone else I don't
recall and pretty much worked as described.  Later on, Tim founded
Galacticomm, which started out as a hardware company making multi-port
serial boards but switched to software when one of their demo program, the
MajorBBS, because a hit.  I the late 80s, Tim (or maybe it was Scott Brinker
[1]) rewrote Flash Attack for the MajorBBS.  I even wrote a program [4] to
help me play the game (which was encouragd by the company as they realized
people would cheat, so they made the cheats available 8-)

  -spc (Interesting game ... )

[1]	Nice guy, but wierdly intense in that optimistic Richard Simmons
	type of way. I first met him in the late 80s/early 90s when he was
	still in high school running one of the larger dialup BBSes in Ft.
	Lauderdale; this was when Flash Attack came out.  A few years later
	in the mid 90s he became President of Galacticomm and during his
	stint the MajorBBS was being ported to Unix [2] and I was hired to
	help the port---I ended up quiting two weeks later over differences
	in coding styles [3].

[2]	http://www.kenmaier.com/gcomm/mbbsunix.htm

[3]	They used K&R style and actively discouraged comments; no function
	or global variable could not be longer than seven characters (ANSI
	C89 limit, but realistically the compilers they used allowed more)
	and they themselves could not rationalize *why* they enforced that
	style (other than, that's what Tim, Scott and Bob [Stein] were used
	to).  My arguments were dismissed, then so was I.

[4]	Still have the code and it works for both the PC and PCjr [5].  It
	was also smaller, faster, less intrusive (it was NOT a TSR) and did
	not require floating point math, unlike the program written by
	Galacticomm itself.  I could also beat people dialed in at 1200 than
	those dialed in as 2400 ... 

[5]	Subtle differences in how the keyboard interrupts work; enough that
	you have to code around them.

---

From: Alan Greenstreet <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Jun 2 01:28:01 2003

On Monday, Jun 2, 2003, at 16:16 Pacific/Auckland, Sean 'Captain 
Napalm' Conner wrote:
>> I never bought it because I had only one PET.

> general sense of the word (multiple machines).

I remember a "battleship" programme for the BBC model B from Byte 
Magazine (probably a couple of years later though). My uncle (who had a 
BBC B) and I with my BBC A sat and copied out the listing from the 
magazine, debugged and saved to tape. Upon connecting the two computers 
up, by their RS232 posts. we found it didn't work...
Taking the tops off both computers we found the model A had all the 
connections for the RS232 cable but no RS232 controller, just an empty 
slot. This was a major blow after all that typing. That is how we found 
the second major difference between model A and B apart from the 16K to 
32K memory increase.

A slightly older networked "game" I know of was written by Roger 
Garrett and published in "Interface Age" magazine in the August / 
September / October 1977 issues. It was then followed by a 
comprehensive book in 1978 (which I have). There is a complete 
programme structure for a networked game - rather ambitiously titled 
"Star Ship Simulation" and based on the previous 1975 books detailing 
the Star Trek Enterprise design blueprints and Star Fleet Technical 
Manual. Each computer is one of the main bridge stations; Science, 
Engineering, Weapons, Navigation, Communications etc.

I have read through most of the book and it is suggested that the 
programme could be written in Fortran, Basic or Machine Code - 
depending on the choice of the programmer. I have never seen or heard 
of this programme running. Has anyone else come across it?

Alan

---

From: Ethan Dicks <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Jun 2 07:19:01 2003

--- Sean 'Captain Napalm' Conner <[email-masked]> wrote:
>   I thought of that as well (it was the December 1980 issue of Byte by
> the way...

Thanks.  I *thought* it was in 1980, but I wasn't certain enough to
claim it.

> ... and later one it became Flash Attack available on the MajorBBS)
> but I discountd that as I thought it used the serial port to hook only
> two machines together

PETs don't come with serial ports.  The VIC-20 and C-64 had ROM code
to give you a bit-banging TTL serial port up to 1200 baud, but that
came after the PET.  The Flash Attack communication protocol uses a
custom cable that transfers a nybble with full handshaking.  One end
of the cable also has a specific pin grounded (the other end is floating)
to allow the computers on either end to determine who sends first.

I made a similar cable and used it extensively to transfer data between
my C-64 and my PET in 1982, long before I got a 4040 drive.

> technically that may make it a "network" but not
> in the general sense of the word (multiple machines).

All you need for a network is two machines.  I've attached several
VAXen over point-to-point sync serial links and run DECnet over them.
Multiple machines and routing (or token passing) is another level
of networking, to be sure, but that doesn't disqualify a network with
only two endpoints.

-ethan

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Jun 2 07:49:00 2003

> Magazine (probably a couple of years later though). My uncle (who had a

So this would have been in 1984 maybe?

--

---

From: "Dr. Ido" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Jun 2 11:28:00 2003

>So this would have been in 1984 maybe?

I think I have the have listing for a least one multiplayer game on the
BBC, not sure if it's this one though.  

From memory the article included instructions for wiring the machines in a
ring network so that more than 2 machines could play.  I can't remember if
it was using RS423 or Econet ports though.