[cctalk] Re: LCM auction

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Fred Cisin wrote:

> We have our own non-theological religious wars, such as vi vs emacs.

sed. Enough sed.

-Rick

[cctalk] Re: LCM auction

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Glen S. wrote:

> Jane, get me off this crazy list.

How many here catch this reference?
Very nice, Glenvery nice.

-Rick

[cctalk] Re: LGP-30 (was LCM auction)

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Mark L. wrote concerning the LGP-30 computer in the LCM+L/Paul Allen Auctions:


> I dare to bet it's the last one.  Anywhere.



It isn't the last one by any means.  There are a few of these machines still 
around. Here are links to a few that are in collections:



https://www.technikum29.de/en/computer/lgp30.php

https://t-lcarchive.org/lgp-30/

http://computermuseum.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de/dev_en/lgp30/lgp30.html (was 
known operational in 2007)

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2022/11/redditor-discovers-legendary-1956-computer-in-grandparents-basement/
   (Found in 2022)



The LGP-30 was designed by Nuclear Physicist and Manhattan Project Team Member 
Stanley Frankel, who also designed

a number of electronic calculators, including the SCM Cogito 240/240SR and the 
Diehl Combitron.



An amazing thing about the LGP-30 is its relative simplicity(compared to 
contemporaries of the time), relying heavily on the aspects of its magnetic 
drum-based memory to hold the working registers as well as program storage for 
the machine.   This means that the machine has very few flip-flops (requiring 
vacuum tubes), and uses a large number of inexpensive semiconductor diode logic 
gates for data routing and control functions.



They weren't fast by any means, but were inexpensive and reliable, and required 
no special power or cooling, making them very popular in a wide variety of 
settings, from military to business.  Quite a large number of them were made, 
and fortunately, some have survived to this day.  I don't know if any of the 
machines that still exist are actually in running condition today, but there 
were a few of them that were known to be running in the decade of 2000.



Rick Bensene

The Old Calculator Museum

https://oldcalcultaormuseum.com

Beavercreek, Oregon   USA

[cctalk] Re: DEC RM03 / CDC 9762

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Guy wrote:

> I'd be interested in the unibus SMD controllers ...


I'd be interested in one also, for my 11/34A, and a couple of Fujitsu pure SMD 
drives I have.  Would
Be a lot faster than the RL02s.

-Rick Bensene
firstnamelastinit...@lastname.com

[cctalk] Re: Relay computers

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Dwight wrote:

> As a kid, I used a handful of radioshack relays to make a sequenced 
> electrical lock. One had to
> enter four each four bit numbers to turn on the lock. Any wrong number and 
> you had to start over. I > think that was first the first time I did a 
> logical design. You'd set the 4 toggle switches for the > next number in 
> sequence and then enter it.
> Not a computer but then, I was just a kid.

Like minds, I guess.

I did the same kind of thing when I was a kid, too.   Except, we were pretty 
poor, and couldn't afford Radio Shack relays.  I had to make my own, out of 
1/4" plywood scraps for the base, tin snipped from coffee can lids, nails for 
pivot points, wire-wound nails for electromagnets, and tacks for contacts.  I 
made both usual relays was well as relays with two coils, one to set the relay 
and another to "unset" it (latching).   The wiring was all telephone wire, from 
a 50-pair cable that my Dad found somewhere and gave to me.   My sequential 
combination lock was for a "burglar alarm" I made for my bedroom door. I made 
my own keyboards using similar materials, but mine were decimal, encoded with 
diodes that a neighbor who was into electronics gave to me.   The combination 
was four digits that had to be entered in the correct order on the keyboard 
outside my door.  I also had a keyboard next to my bed that allowed me to 
override the alarm if someone knocked to come in, as well as to reset the 
password at any time.   The password was stored by sixteen of those set/reset 
latching relays.  The four digit password had to be entered entirely, then an 
"ENTER" key pressed, and if there was an error anywhere in the password, as 
soon as ENTER was pressed, the alarm would go off, which was a ringer salvaged 
from a telephone that someone gave me.The only way to shut off the alarm 
was to enter the correct code. If someone opened the bedroom door when the 
alarm was set (by entering the code) the bell would start ringing.  The 
transformer from my train set powered the thing.  It worked reliably, but my 
Mom grew tired of it quickly.  Not easy to enter the code with a basket-load of 
clothes in her arms.   I learned a lot from making that thing.  The hardest 
part was making the sequencer that would step as each digit was entered, then 
compared the entered digit against the corresponding digit of the stored code.  
That took quite a few relays.  I got quite good at making the relays so that 
they were reliable and consistent in their behavior.   It was a total rats nest 
of wiring on a piece of larger plywood that leaned up against a wall in my 
room.   

A few years later, I built a four-bit binary adder using a bit-serial ALU and 
sequencer made with old telephone relays.

The two numbers to be added were entered using a keyboard I made from a 
salvaged touch tone telephone keyboard.  Then, an ADD (#) button was pressed, 
and the sequencer (which was made with a motor that turned a drum with contacts 
made from sheet metal screws) would step through selecting each group of two 
bits, adding them, saving the carry, and then moving onto the next two bits.  
The result was displayed on five #47 lamps.   It was not particularly fast; the 
fastest I could make it go would give a result in about 1/2 second.  Trying to 
run it any faster resulted in errors, probably due to issues with the design 
rather than the relays themselves.  The thing covered a tabletop, again wired 
together with telephone wire.   I tired of it pretty quickly because it just 
added numbers. I had visions of somehow making a memory out of relays and 
making some kind of programming method, again probably using a drum with 
contacts that would close when a screw was screwed into the drum, such that it 
could run short programs, but I didn't have the space to build out the rest of 
it, so, I eventually took it apart so I could have my table back.

What I'd give to be able to have all that free time during the summer when 
school was out.   Virtually no real responsibilities (mow the yard, keep my 
room "clean", do dishes) - just limitless time to dream up projects to build 
with limited resources. I had no training in logic design, I just kind of 
figured it out as I went along.

-Rick   

[cctalk] Re: Fwd: Civility; Was Re: Re: LCM auction pre-notice

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Dennis Boone wrote: 

> Folks,

> Once again, it seems I need to ask everyone to drop this discussion.  I 
> _still_ don't >
> want to have the moderation flags and banhammers.

Seconded.   

Though, I'll get in my last words about it before the thread hopefully dies off.

The situation with LCM+L is what it is.   Unless someone has the wherewithal to 
challenge the whole mess within the legal system (and probably lose anyway), 
there's nothing that anyone can do about it.I, as is clear many others who 
inhabit this list, have a great deal of  frustration built up about the demise 
of LCM+L.  With me, it's most specifically felt in the way that the whole thing 
was executed.  At some point, though, I just have to let it go, which is right 
now.   I agree with Dennis that the time has come for this discussion to expire.

LCM+L  R.I.P.   You will be missed.  Thanks to all (which includes some members 
of this list) who contributed to the amazing place that LCM+L was.  Mr. Allen's 
heart was in the right place, or he wouldn't have devoted his resources to 
creating it in the first place.  Unfortunately, his life didn't last long 
enough for him to assure that after he was gone it would have some means by 
which it could continue on in his memory.

Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
https://oldcalculatormuseum.com
Beavercreek, Oregon   USA

[cctalk] Re: Seattle’s Living Computers Museum logs off for good as Paul Allen estate will auction vintage items

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

> Allen’s estate, which has been managing and winding down his vast array of 
> holdings 
> since his death in 2018, confirmed to GeekWire that the 12-year-old museum is 
> closed for 
> good. 

I held out hope that somehow this would not be the end of this place. Alas, it 
was not to be.  

I had the occasion to have a nice informal chat with Mr. Allen about LCM 
shortly after it opened. I got the clear impression that A) He was absolutely 
devoted and passionate about this aspect of history, B) He wanted as many 
people as possible to be able to experience this history *hands-on*, and C) 
that he wanted it to be a lasting legacy of his passion.

Of course, things can change along the way, and I know that the museum was 
struggling with the rather enormous expenses of keeping all of the machines up 
and running, as well as the expertise necessary to keep them that way(even with 
some very gracious volunteers), not to mention all of the administrative 
aspects of such an endeavor.   

Re-creating the inter-bay wiring of the Control Data 6500, as well as keeping 
the refrigeration system running with unobtainium parts, by themselves, had to 
cost a King's Ransom.

The onset of the pandemic and the absolute necessity to close a "hands on" 
museum made the situation even more dire.   

I suspect that the costs involved with trying to resurrect it in any way that 
would have been consistent with Mr. Allen's passion were simply unsupportable.

The thing that I’m really pissed off about is that there were no updates about 
the status of the museum for the entire period of time since its closure until 
the news release today.The veil of secrecy surrounding the whole thing 
seems sketchy to me.  

Based on my admittedly short visit with him, I honestly don't think that Mr. 
Allen would be at all happy with the outcome and how it was managed.

I will cherish the many memories of this amazing and unique place, and am 
grateful that Mr. Allen built and supported it during his lifetime.  I am just 
as thankful for all of the amazing people that made the LCM what it was.   

Rest in Pieces, DCM (Dead Computer Museum).

-Rick
--
Rick Bensene
The Old (and still living) Calculator Museum
https://oldcalculatormuseum.com

[cctalk] Re: Experience using an Altair 8800 ("Personal computer" from 70s)

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Liam Proven wrote:

> Microprocessors are what created the PC. No µP = not a PC.

So, if I get this right, the term "PC" to means something like the "personal 
computer" of today (children of IBM PC or Apple Macintosh) or at least perhaps 
something as old as an Apple II, a Commodore PET.

Perhaps even an Altair or IMSAI, though these are a bit different than an Apple 
II or a PET or TRS-80 because they required additional "stuff" to make them 
comparable the Apple, Commodore, or Radio Shack machines.  You'd have to add 
some sort of display and a controller card for the display, a keyboard of some 
sort, and at least an output port for an external printer, and perhaps a serial 
port to make it roughly equivalent to an Apple II or a TRS-80.

I find it had to make distinctions in some cases, because some machines tend to 
bend the rules a bit.

How about the Hewlett Packard 9830 "calculator"?  It had BASIC in ROM, and came 
up in BASIC when powered-on. No microprocessor, though.  Instead, it had a TTL 
implementation of a somewhat scaled down version of HP's 2100 minicomputer CPU. 
  It had a 40-character LED dot matrix display, a digital cassette tape drive, 
and you could sit a fast thermal printer on top of it and plug it right into a 
connector on the back of the machine.   It had ROMpack slots for additional 
functionality, and I/O expansion slots that could provide connections to 
external hard disk subsystems (that could be shared among multiple 9830's), a 
plotter, a punched paper tape reader, and a punched card reader, among others.  
 It was expensive.  But, it was intended as a single-user computer.   For the 
most part, this sounds like some early personal computers. 

Some HP 9830s were bought new by people with the means for their home use as a 
"personal computer, and for the time, a quite capable one at that.   This one 
is a little tricky because of its lack of a microprocessor.  But, it still 
seems to be pretty PC-ish to me.

I assume by the definition that since a Tektronix 4051 has a Motorola 6800 
inside, it's a PC, right?  The 4051 had no multi-user capabilities, and was 
fully intended for one person to sit down in front of it and do whatever it was 
they wanted to do, be it playing a game (there were a lot of games for the 
machine), or do some data acquisition, visualization and manipulation, or even 
mundane stuff like inventory, payroll, receivables, payables...you get the 
picture.  It was a truly general-purpose computer.

That said, what about a Tektronix 4052(1978)?   

It doesn't have a microprocessor in it, but it was definitely designed as a 
personal computing device with a graphics display and built-in mass storage 
(cartridge tape), just like the 4051. In fact, looking at a 4052, if you ignore 
the "4052" badge on the machine, you can't tell it apart from a 4051, and from 
a BASIC programming standpoint, they are the same.  

While the 4051 was very successful, and absolutely did end up in the homes of 
individual buyers (base price of $5,995, but there were individuals that had 
the means to buy one as their own personal computer for at home).  The 4051's 
intended markets were engineering, scientific, and data acquisition/data 
reduction work. 

One criticism of the 4051 was that it was a bit too slow on number crunching 
and drawing graphics, requiring some patience if you are doing some serious 
numerical processing/graphics.   

To respond to those critics saying that the 4051 being too slow, Tektronix 
designed a bit-slice implementation of the 6800 (using the 2901 bit-slice 
devices, fast bipolar ROM for microcode storage, and a 16-bit wide bus versus 8 
bits of the 6800 to speed up double-byte operations), added a few tweaks to the 
instruction set to address more memory than the 6800 could natively 
address(separate RAM and ROM space, so RAM could be 64K, and ROM could be 64K, 
but banking of the ROM made even more space available), and hooked in the rest 
of the 4051 (storage tube graphical display, cartridge tape unit, keyboard, 
GPIB, and  ROMPACK slot) such that it was for all intents and purposes, a 
faster 4051.  With no microprocessor.   Of course, it cost more than the 4051.  
 However, like the 4051, some 4052's did sell to individuals to get themselves 
a powerful personal computer at home.  The 4052 was much more powerful than any 
Apple II, Atari 400/800, TRS-80, or Commodore PET/VIC-20/64.   Yes, most of 
those machines could do graphics, and they were raster bitmapped or tricky 
equivalents thereof(Atari), but their graphics were primitiS1281ve in 
comparison to the 4051/4052's 1024x780 point vector storage display.

What about a Three Rivers/ICL PERQ 1(1980)?  It had a microprocessor in it, a 
Z-80. However, the Z-80 was relegated to being used as an I/O processor for the 
hard disk, floppy disk, speech synthesizer, IEEE-488, and RS232-serial port. 
The main CPU was a bipolar custom CPU that used 74S181 high-speed ALU slices, 
and a microcoded ar

[cctalk] Re: terminology [was: First Personal Computer]

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Mike Katz wrote:

> I'm sorry but you are misinformed about the HP-41C Calculator.

> The HP-41 was the first calculator that had Alpha-Numerics.

That is not true.  

Technically, out of the box, it was the HP 9830.  Yes, it wasn't a handheld 
calculator, and it didn't run on batteries(it was big and quite heavy and 
required standard 115V AC power), but it had an alpha-numeric display(and 
optionally a printer) that could be programmatically written to, and the 
machine could accept alpha-numeric input and process it as such.

The HP 9820 had an alphanumeric display, and could be programmed to generate 
alphanumeric prompts on the display, but I don't believe (off the top of my 
head, I could be wrong) it had the capability to accept and process 
alpha-numerics out of the box.

The HP 9820 and 9830 were introduced in June of 1972.  Seven years before the 
HP-41.

-Rick
--
Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
https://oldcalculatormuseum.com
Beavercreek, OR  USA

[cctalk] Re: terminology [was: First Personal Computer]

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Carey S. writes:

> If it only manipulates numeric data, it is a calculator.  It must be able to 
> search, 
> rearrange look up, compare, and display characters.  I would have thought 
> that to be
> obvious.   ...if it cannot give a text description of the answer, it is 
> a 
> calculator.

> Also something about arbitrary branches to any location (ok, any executable 
> location if 
> something has separate code and data memory).

So, are the HP 9820, HP 9830, Tektronix 31, Tektronix 4051, and the Texas 
Instruments 
SR-60 calculators or computers?

All of them were at least initially marketed as calculators(except perhaps the 
4051, but it could definitely serve as a calculator, though massive overkill).

This was because if someone submitted a capital equipment request for a 
"computer", bean counters would immediately reject it, while calculators would 
sail right through.   

Why?   

Because computers were big complicated machines that required expensive, brainy 
people to support, and they needed all kinds of "extras" like special power, 
air conditioning, storage systems,  printers, terminals, maintenance contracts, 
installation fees, and other stuff that cost even more money.  At least, that 
was the mentality, be it right or wrong.  It has been historically documented 
as such in numerous books written about that period in time.

Calculators... well, you just took 'em out of the box, set them on the desk, 
plugged them in and off you go.  Didn’t really matter if it was a four-banger, 
or something like an HP 9830(if all you wanted to do was calculate with it).

With machines like this, engineers and scientists could get themselves a 
"computer" without the fuss of having to say it was a computer on their 
equipment request.

All of the above devices could be programmed to manipulate and display and/or 
print alpha-numeric and special characters, They could be programmed to search, 
compare, find, re-arrange, sort, combine, and manipulate numerical and 
non-numerical data.

They all also had the ability to branch to an arbitrary location within a 
program, though off the top of my head, I think that all of the machines except 
the 4051(EXEC) (and maybe  the HP 9830, I can't remember off the top of my head 
- it may have required a special ROM module to be added in order to do that) 
didn't have the ability to branch to arbitrary data in memory and execute it.

All of the named machines certainly could qualify as a computer, right?
  
At the same time, each of them could have a mathematical expression (some even 
with variables) entered as it would be written on paper, without any 
programming, and they would display/print the numeric result after pressing a 
single key to terminate the entry.  These expressions could include functions 
such as logarithms, trig, roots, exponentials, etc., just like a calculator.  

Perhaps that really does make them calculators?

Why did Digital Equipment Corporation brand their computers as "PDP"?  It was 
an acronym for "Programmed Data Processor".  A "PDP" isn't a computer for all 
bean counters might know. The point of this designation (which was only the PDP 
part, not its expansion) was to allow capital requests to get through the 
approval process without the fussy "computer" word in the request.  

You'd just write down "PDP 11/70" on the request.   As long as the money was in 
your budget, the worst that might happen is someone from finance may ring you 
up and ask you "What's a PDP 11/70?", and you could say, "Oh, it's a really 
fancy calculator" (not a lie), and they'd go away happy, and your request would 
be granted, even if it amounted to tens of thousands (or more) dollars.  

Weeks later, you'd have an really powerful Programmed Data Processor show up at 
the loading dock, no one really the wiser.

This is probably exaggerating the reality a bit, but the true point of the PDP 
designation was to make it easier for engineers, scientists, and anyone else 
that needed a real computer but had a bureaucracy to go through before they 
could get one.

Perhaps the distinction noted isn't quite as clear cut as indicated.

-Rick

PS: Carey, I am working on a response to your message from yesterday, it's just 
taking a while, hopefully it'll arrive to you later today or tomorrow sometime.
--
Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
https://oldcalculatormuseum.com

[cctalk] Re: First Personal Computer

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

While the LGP-30(vacuum tube/drum), G-15(vacuum tube/drum), and 
PB-250(transistor/delay lines) predated it, the ground-breaking Olivetti 
Programma 101(transistor/delay line) programmable desktop calculator was 
officially called a "personal computer" in some of its advertising and sales 
literature.  It was introduced in October of 1965.   

Late in the game as far as single-user, standard AC-line-powered computing 
devices compared to those machines and probably others, but those machines, 
AFAIK, were not advertised nor specified as "personal computers".
  
That said, I am much more aware of electronic calculator history than computer 
history, so I could be entirely biased here.  Also, the Programma 101, as I've 
stated here before, only scratches the definition of a true computer in that it 
is not capable of handling any data type but floating point binary-coded 
decimal numbers, has very limited data storage capability, and had no 
peripheral interfacing capability.

There were quite a number of single-user computing devices made and sold that 
ran on standard AC power, and were vastly more capable than the Programma 101, 
and predated it, but, AFAIK, were not advertised or particularly marketed as 
"personal computers".

One that comes to mind is the Monroe Monrobot III(vacuum tube/drum), introduced 
in February, 1955.

Another is the IBM 610 "Auto Point"(vacuum tube/drum) computer, introduced in 
1957.
It was originally named the "Personal Automatic Computer" (PAC) by its designer.

I'm sure that there are quite a few other machines developed in the mid-to-late 
1950's that would qualify as personal computing devices, but these two are the 
ones that I'm aware of that seem to fit the bill.   Some of these may actually 
have been capable of manipulating data types other than decimal numbers.

In 1962, Casio introduced its AL-1 programmable (up to 360 steps) relay-based 
electric calculator.  It was definitely intended as a personal computing 
device, and calculations could be performed manually from a keyboard much like 
a regular calculator, but also automatically via plastic toothed gears that 
would have teeth broken off of them to encode program steps.  The gears would 
be electrically read by the machine and directed the machine to perform 
computer-like operations.

I'm not arguing that any of these, including the Programma 101, are the first 
"personal computers" by any means.   I'm just adding some thoughts to the 
discussion.

Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
https://oldcalculatormuseum.com

[cctalk] Re: ANITA ((was: Experience using an Altair 8800 ("Personal computer" from 70s)

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Christian Corti wrote:

> The Anita electronic desktop calculators are a perfect example for the usage 
> of 
> selenium rectifiers in logic gates.

..and anyone who has restored one knows that the vast majority of the 
back-to-back selenium  diode packages have to be replaced with something else 
as they no longer function properly.  Ambient moisture kills Selenium as a 
semiconductor, and even though these devices were packaged to avoid that to 
some degree, after 60 years, stuff happens.

Many restorers resort to de-soldering the dual-diode packages from the circuit 
boards, hollowing out the package (removing the Selenium rectifiers and the 
potting material used) and installing back-to-back conventional Silicon diodes 
that are rated for the appropriate voltages involved in these machines, potting 
the diodes in place with some kind of material (epoxy?), and re-soldering the 
package to the circuit board.  These calculators used gas-discharge active 
logic elements (e.g., thyratrons and dekatrons) and used (relatively speaking) 
high voltages for their logic levels.  Fortunately, these gas-discharge devices 
seem to fare quite well with time, and though some do fail due to atomic-level 
outgassing or simple breakage, the majority of them work just as well the day 
the machine came off the assembly line.

Such practice with the Selenium rectifier modules makes the calculator look 
original if done carefully, and allows it to function when operation was 
impossible with the original devices.   It is an extremely tedious and 
time-consuming process, as there are a great many of these devices used in the 
first-generation Sumlock/ANITA calculators.  

I applaud anyone with the courage and patience to perform such surgery on these 
unusual artifacts. Fortunately, the circuit boards are quite robustly made, and 
the traces are large and well adhered to the base material of the circuit board 
(unlike many later calculators), making such an operation feasible. 

I am not brave enough to try this with the museum's ANITA Mk8.  After 25+ years 
of owning this artifact, I have not even tried to apply power to it in any 
fashion, and probably never will.  It is one of the very few calculators in the 
museum that is probably not in operational condition, as I strive for all of 
the exhibited machines to be operable and available for visitors to the 
physical museum to play with if they desire.  I'm content to leave it as it is 
for a display machine, as it is in very nice original condition.

Interesting to note that many ANITA Mk8 machines have a single transistor in 
them.  It's in the power supply.   The designers were comfortable enough using 
these relatively fussy gas-discharge logic devices as digital devices(they had 
developed machines like Colossus using this technology considerably before 
transistors were a thing, so there was certainly historical precedent), but the 
transistor was just fine for an analog purpose in the power supply.   

Boy, did they ever get it backwards (in terms of the longevity of gas-discharge 
logic elements in electronic calculators and what became the ubiquitous use to 
transistors)!  

Not intended at all to slight the accomplishment of Sumlock Comptometer in the 
development of these calculators.   They set the stage for the explosion of 
what was to become a many hundreds of million dollar market by the end of the 
decade, not to mention setting the electronic calculator up to be the driving 
force behind integrated circuit development for a consumer-oriented device.   

ICs before their development for use in calculators were only for big mainframe 
computers, military weapons systems, the spooks at places like the NSA, and the 
space program.  For that matter, the ANITA Mk7/8  could be said to be the 
progenitors for the development of the CPU on a chip, and by extension, the 
personal computer.   

Notice I didn't specify any machine, or say "first".  Slippery slope there.

Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
https://oldcalculatormuseum.com

[cctalk] Re: Thirties techies and computing history

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

On 5/20/24 10:25, Bill Degnan via cctalk wrote:

>>> American Computer Museum
>>> Computer History Museum
>>> Computer Museum of America
>>> Large Scale Systems Museum
>>> Rhode Island Computer Museum
>>> System Source Computer Museum

Of course, there's the Living Computer Museum--oh, wait

...and wait...and wait...and

$&#**^% Bean Counters!

[cctalk] Re: Wang Laboratories calculators (Was Bowmar handheld calculator)

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Fred Cisin wrote

> In 1970 or 1971, Wang had a tiny desktop calculator that had a card 
> reader! The card reader was an external peripheral, that clam-shell > closed 
> on individual port-a-punch cards (perforated normal sized >
> cards using every other column)

It was actually available before 1970. It was Wang Laboratories' 300-Series of 
electronic calculators.  

The "tiny" part was the visible part, which was just the keyboard and Nixie 
tube display.   It connected to an electronics package which was usually put 
under a desk or sometimes even quite a distance from the keyboard/display unit. 
 

The punched card programming peripheral sat between the keyboard/display and 
the calculator electronics package, and effectively "pressed keys" on the 
keyboard designated by the punches on the card, at high speed.  

On all but the 370 and 380 keyboard devices, the programs punched into the 
cards were simple linear programs without test & branch capability, or looping. 
  Looping could be manually done by just restarting the program at the 
beginning, and continuing to do so until the answer converged on the final 
result. 

There were also the somewhat larger 360KT and 360KR keyboards that had built-in 
diode ROM programs that calculated trig functions by sending the keycodes to 
the electronics package to carry out the operations necessary to perform the 
trig functions.   

There were a number of different electronics packages that were available, with 
the low-end model (the 300E) having access to only the basic four math 
functions.  The 310E added square root and x^2, the 320E added natural 
logarithm and e^x functions to the 310.   The 360E added four store/recall 
memory registers along with the functions of the 320E.  

The last of the 300-series was the 362E electronics package that provided 
access to ten memory registers, each of which could be split in half to store 
two five-digit numbers, along with the math functions of the 360E.   

Then there were the SE type electronics packages.  To my knowledge, there were 
the 310SE, 320SE, and 360SE.  

The SE electronics packages took the core calculating logic of the 
310E/320E/360E and stuffed some multiplexing logic around it, allowing up to 
four keyboard/display units to be connected up to it that operated in a 
round-robin timesharing mode.  

The 370 Programmer Keyboard Unit included a similar punched card reader, but 
there was extra logic inside the keyboard that allowed conditional testing and 
branching capability.  Up to four of these card readers could be daisy-chained 
to the 370 keyboard to allow programs up 320 steps.  

The program codes consumed 6 bits, so each column of the 40 column card (a 
standard IBM punched card, but with pre-scored holes every other column) could 
contain two instructions, allowing 80 instruction steps per card.   

The 380 Programmer Keyboard Unit was similar to the 370 in terms of capability, 
but instead of using punched cards for "storing" the program, the program steps 
were recorded on what was essentially an 8-Track tape cartridge that was 
inserted into a slot on the back panel of the 380.  The tape in the cartridge 
was in a loop, and was positioned by a rather noisy ratcheting system akin to a 
stepping relay that moved the tape forward. Branching was accomplished by 
moving the tape forward until the target location was found.  Depending on 
where the branch was targeted, the tape could have to move to the end of the 
program, then continue moving until the beginning of the program is found, then 
searching for the loop target.  This operation could consume quite a bit of 
time.  The tape cartridge allowed for considerably larger programs, but was 
quite slow in terms of tape positioning for branching and looping. 

The initial announcement of the 300-series calculator occurred in 1965, with 
the 300E/310E/320E electronics units, and 300K, 310K, 320K keyboard units, 
along with the CP-1 punched card reader, of which up to four could be connected 
daisy-chain style between the keyboard unit and the electronics unit.   

Later the 360E electronics package was added, and the 360K keyboard unit for 
the 360E added keys to access the four memory registers.

A bit later, the 360KT and 360KR trig keyboards were introduced, with the 360KT 
accepting arguments and results in Degrees, and the 360KR in Radians.

The 310SE and 320SE four-user electronics packages came out sometime in 1967.   

The 360SE four-user electronics package came out in 1968, and also the 370 
Programmer and 371 card reader as well as the 380 Programmer.   

Lastly, sometime in late '68 or early '69, the 362E electronics package came 
out, and a 362K keyboard (which was identical to a 360K keyboard but with 
different keycap legends for the memory keys) was introduced with the 362E. The 
362E marked the end of the 300-Series.

There were a lot of peripheral devices that were available for the 370 and 380 
programmers, incl

[cctalk] Re: Drum memory on pdp11's? Wikipedia thinks so....

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Bill wrote:

> I'll bet the source was talking about large contemporary storage >
> units that looked like drums or may have been called "drums" but 
> were not actual 50's drum memory with tubes and such.  There was no > 
> rotating drum storage, the media rotates in the PDP era.

> Take a look at any pdp 11 peripheral handbook, there would be drum > memory 
> there if it was an official product.

Remember that there was a very active third-party peripheral device market for 
the PDP-11 series.  Could be that someone offered a head-per-track drum store 
that the person that made the update to Wikipedia may have spied.   

On a somewhat related note, many years ago, sometime in the late 1970's to 
perhaps no later than '81, I toured a local (Portland, OR) timesharing service 
that was called "Information Sciences, Inc.".

They had their datacenter in a building in downtown Portland.   They offered 
timeshare services on a well-built-out and heavily-modified DEC PDP-10 (KA-10). 
 

The machine had a bunch of add-on solid-state memory boxes, as well as a real 
drum memory.  The drum memory unit was quite large, a box about 5 feet wide, 4 
feet tall, and probably about 3-4 feet deep.  

The controller for the drum was another box that was about the same size as one 
of the memory boxes, and was cool because it had a bank of lamps at the top of 
the cabinet that showed the activity of the drum.  It was flickering like 
crazy, as it was during prime-time that I was there, and they had about 180 
simultaneous users on the system at the time.  

I was told that the drum was a head-per-track unit, and revolved at 8,000 RPM.  
The KA-10 had been modified to support virtual memory using a pager box of some 
sort, and the drum was used to support high-speed paging and swapping.   

The drum was kind of ominous, as you could sense the kinetic energy that was 
just waiting to be released if a bearing failed catastrophically.   It had this 
low frequency resonance that felt as if it permeated the entire data center.  

The guy that took me on the tour said that the wall behind the drum had to be 
specially reinforced as if the drum exited the reinforced cabinet due to some 
kind of failure while at speed, it would have gone through any conventional 
wall like it was made of paper, and another wall which was the side of the 
building, and would have fallen 6 floors to the ground below, which obviously 
would have been disastrous.   

Apparently if there was a failure, due to the direction the drum rotated it'd 
come out the  back of the cabinet rather than the front.  I was also told that 
the drum cabinet had special mounting that was a large structure of steel beams 
in the mezzanine level beneath the datacenter that connected the mounts to the 
main support beams for the building, because the gyroscopic effects of the drum 
would have torn out anything else.   

The mounts had to be inspected every six months to look for cracks or any other 
sign of stress-induced problems.   

I don't know who made the drum unit, as I didn't see any tag on it, but the 
cabinetry was colored a significantly darker shade of blue than the DEC boxes 
were, which tells me that it was probably a third-party device.  

I was also told that the drum had its own UPS and genset, because it would be 
"bad" if it ever shut down in an unplanned way.   Apparently there was a 
procedure that involved slowing down the drum revolution in a stepwise fashion. 
This apparently took something like 2 1/2 hours to perform, and was 
orchestrated by the controller.  I never heard what "bad" meant in the context 
of the drum powering down in an unplanned fashion, but the tone of voice of the 
guy explaining it made it clear that it was something to be avoided at all cost.

This was the first time that I'd ever seen a PDP-10, notably a KA-10, and I 
absolutely fell in love with the console of the machine.   It's my favorite 
classic blinkenlights console.

-Rick   

[cctalk] Re: Problem with Dell Vostro 1700

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

On Fri, Apr 5, 2024 at 1:45 PM Van Snyder via cctalk 
wrote:

> I have a Dell Vostro.

Sellam responded:

>Um...

...Yeah.

[cctalk] Re: oscilloscopes

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

I wrote:

>> The digits are among the nicest looking digits that I've ever seen 
>> on a CRT display, including those on the CDC scopes as well as IBM >> 
>> console displays.
 
To which Paul responded:

> I have, somewhere, a copy of a paper that describes analog circuits > for 
> generating waveforms for digits along the lines you describe.  
> Might have been from MIT, in the 1950s, but right now I can't find > it.

> Found it (on paper): "Generating characters" by Kenneth Perry and 
> Everett Aho, > Electronics, Jan 3, 1958, pp. 72-75.

> Bitsavers has it in the MIT/LincolnLaboratory section:   
> https://bitsavers.org/pdf/mit/lincolnLaboratory/Perry_and_Aho__Generating_Characters_-_Electronics_19580103.pdf

Very interesting.   Here's a link to the patent for the display system on the 
Wyle Labs calculator:

https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/17/51/58/89c19cee6c60e2/US3305843.pdf

The concepts are very similar to the paper written up in ELECTRONICS magazine 
in early 1958 that you found.  Your memory is incredible to have been able to 
have this pop into your mind when you read my description of the way the 
calculator generates its display.

Thank you for looking up this article!   It'll provide some nice background for 
the concepts of generating characters this way when I finally get to 
documenting the Wyle WS-01/WS-02 calculators in an Old Calculator Museum 
exhibit.

I wonder if the inventor of the display system for the calculator (in fact, the 
inventor of the entire Wyle Labs calculator architecture) had read this article 
at some point prior?  

I scanned through the patent for the calculator display system looking for any 
reference to the article or any document from MIT relating, and I couldn't find 
anything.   

The inventor is still alive, and I have talked to him on the telephone a couple 
of times.   For his advanced age, he is still quite sharp, and remembers a lot 
of the challenges involved with trying to make a solid-state electronic 
calculator that would fit on a (large) desktop using early 1960's technology.   
 

Here's a link to a little information about the calculator:

https://oldcalculatormuseum.com/w-wyle.html 

It's hard to tell from the photo (from advertising material of the day) how 
large the machine is, but  the dimensions and weight (50 pounds!) are included 
in the specifications at the end of the page.
It's quite a monster.

The two models of the machine differed in that the WS-01 utilized a 
home-brewed(e.g., made entirely within Wyle Labs) rotating magnetic memory as 
the storage for the working registers (as well as for timing tracks that 
provided clocking signals).   It proved to be very temperamental with many 
failures in the hands of customers that gave the machine somewhat of a 
tarnished reputation in the market.  A magnetostrictive delay line that was 
much more reliable replaced the rotating magnetic memory in the re-worked WS-02 
model of the calculator.

-Rick

[cctalk] Re: oscilloscopes

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Paul wrote:

> The DD60 and its associated controller in the mainframe (6612 or 6602) was an 
> > interesting beast.  The interface between controller and display is a 
> hybrid, > with the positioning information delivered as 9 bits each of X and 
> Y, but the > character vectors are generated in the controller and sent to 
> the display as 
> analog waveforms, X and Y on differential pairs.

> Another oddity is the character waveform generation: that uses two pairs of 
> A/D converters, and the converters are essentially base one --  6 equally 
> weighted inputs to produce output values 0..6.  And since ROMs were hard to  
> come by in 1964, at least ones with 100 ns cycle time, the digital inputs for 
> > the waveform generators are an amazingly large pile of gates.

I was a systems operator (as it was called back in the day) on a Control Data 
Cyber 73 at Tektronix for a number of years.   The round console displays on 
the machine were simply beautiful.  The characters were very clear and easy to 
read, even though they packed a lot of them on the screen.   One thing that I 
thought was particularly cool about it is that you could pull up a page of any 
section of memory and watch the live data flicker around as the machine was 
running.   Pretty amazing.

On a similar display topic, I have a very unusual old electronic calculator 
made by a US company called Wyle Laboratories.  The machine was designed in the 
1962-1063 timeframe.  It is all Germanium-Transistor and Resistor logic(RTL).  
The Model WS-01/WS-02 (two versions, both using the same display subsystem, but 
varied in terms of the main register storage) calculators used a CRT display 
for showing the content of the registers to the user.   The display
consists of six lines of 24 digits each.   The six lines represent the content 
of three memory registers, the accumulator, a multiplier-quotient register, and 
the numeric entry register.  

Even with only having to render the digits zero through nine and a decimal 
point (the calculator didn't support negative numbers; they were represented 
using tens complement form), the display generator also used a batch of 
diode-transistor gates to generate the digits.The interesting thing about 
it is that instead of generating strokes to create the digits, the machine uses 
sine/cosine waveforms that are gated by the character generation logic to draw 
the digits on the screen.   The position of the digits, like the CDC scopes, is 
derived by precision resistor DACs, and then a mixer takes over as the 
character is drawn using gated segments of the sine and cosine waveforms mixed 
together with the position voltage.   The result is really beautifully rendered 
digits that look almost like they are drawn by a draftsperson who is extremely 
consistent in the drawing of each digit.  The CRT has yellow-orange phosphor 
with a moderate persistence, so when the digits change, they look like they 
quickly morph from one digit to the next.  
   
The digits are among the nicest looking digits that I've ever seen on a CRT 
display, including those on the CDC scopes as well as IBM console displays.

They are far more aesthetically (to my taste, anyway) pleasing than the 
segmented digits drawn on other CRT-display calculators such as the HP 9100A/B, 
Friden EC-130/132 and 116x, Victor 3900 and 14-321/14-322,  SCM Cogito 
240/240SR, Busicom 202/207/2017, and some calculators (usually clones of US or 
Japanese-designed machines) made in the former Soviet Union.

-Rick

[cctalk] Re: oscilloscopes

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

>> And still works! Built to withstand an atomic bombardment.

Except for the EMP.   It'll theoretically render such devices nice looking, 
well-built scrap.

The old completely vacuum-tube-based, discrete component oscilloscope from back 
in the day  may actually survive such an event if it's outside the blast radius 
but still reasonably sheltered; and you are also outside lethal fallout zones, 
or can shelter and survive in radioactivity-safe places for a long time.

Stock up on quality-made (e.g., Tektronix, Hewlett Packard) tube and 
cold-cathode-based test equipment (VTVM, oscilloscope, etc.) as well as quality 
radios and transceivers.   Hopefully they will continue to serve as interesting 
artifacts of a time gone by, but if something were to go sideways in our world, 
they could potentially come in very handy.   

[cctalk] Re: RD54 Maxtor XT-2190 w/one long meep

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Unsticking stiction is different than dislodging a stuck actuator.  

Stiction is where the heads resting on the disk surface resist the torque of 
the spindle drive, causing the drive not to spin up.  Generally it is caused by 
weak driver transistors in the spindle drive such that the spindle motor does 
not generate sufficient torque to overcome the static tension on the disk 
caused by the numerous heads sitting on it.   

This didn't happen on drives that retracted the heads either completely off of 
the disk surface, or had a ramp mechanism that raised the heads off the surface 
when the heads were retracted.   The retraction would occur at power off when a 
large capacitor was discharged across the voicecoil with enough energy to pull 
the heads to the parking position.  

However, some drives actually had a dedicated landing zone on the disk surfaces 
where the heads could gently settle down (land) onto the disk surface as the 
platters spun down.  It was this type of drive that tended to have issues with 
stiction. 

Other cases where stiction could become a problem is in situations where the 
power-off retract didn't work properly, leaving the heads in contact with the 
disk surface when they weren't supposed to be.In these situations, if the 
stiction was cleared by rapping the drive the right way, data damage could 
occur.  

In the case of stiction where there is a landing zone, since there's no 
data/servo information in the landing zone area, causing an abrupt acceleration 
in the correct axis could dislodge the heads, allowing the drive to spin up 
properly.  So, rapping them with a hammer was a solution for these cases, 
though I typically used a small-sized dead-blow rubber mallet rather than a 
hammer, as it wouldn't induce as much resonance as rapping the HDA case with a 
metal-headed hammer. 

Also, I managed to use a variant of the "twist" method to clear stiction.  I 
would hook a power connector to the drive, with a switch that switched the +12 
and +5 power.  I would hold the drive in one hand, and the switch in the other. 
 I'd throw the switch to the ON position, and at the same time, give the drive 
a quick twist.  The twist would accelerate the platters just enough to overcome 
the stiction such that the spindle drive could start up properly.   I'd let it 
run long enough to warm up, then shut it off, and quickly hook it up to the 
archival system, and it'd properly spin up and I could get the data off.

I also used the hammer method to release stiction.  

Another trick was for drives whose read/write amplifiers (which were typically 
situated within the sealed chamber, thus not replaceable except in a clean-room 
facility) had become flakey, and the drive would start getting lots of I/O 
errors.

I would take the drive and put it inside a large ziplock bag, along with a bag 
of desiccant(this part is really important to suck up moisture in the air in 
the bag), and a small battery-powered digital thermometer.  I'd put it in the 
freezer until the drive had reached roughly 42F, and then take it out, and 
immediately hook it up to an archival system and power it up while it was still 
cold.   

This would allow me to get the data off without I/O errors as long as I could 
get what I needed before the drive warmed up enough that the weakness in the 
amplifiers again became a problem.   I found out about this trick somewhere on 
USENET many moons ago.   It worked for me a number of times.   

I can't say that it'd work on anything more recent than /early/ 3.5" hard disk 
drives, though. Newer technology drives have such tight tolerances that the 
cooling might cause shrinkage that could cause head crashes, so take heed.  

-Original Message-
From: Bill Gunshannon via cctalk [mailto:cctalk@classiccmp.org] 
Sent: Saturday, February 24, 2024 6:10 AM
To: cctalk@classiccmp.org
Cc: Bill Gunshannon 
Subject: [cctalk] Re: RD54 Maxtor XT-2190 w/one long meep




Back in the day when these disks were common I used to elicit a good laugh from 
my boss when I got out my little mallet and smacked the side of the drive. 
Stiction was the problem but a good hammer fixes anything.  And, no, I never 
had it damage a disk.  I guess it was all in the technique.  :-)

bill

[cctalk] Re: RD54 Maxtor XT-2190 w/one long meep

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Just make sure when you torque the drive as mentioned that you rotate it in as 
close to the same axis of rotation as the platter(s) spin as possible, as any 
other direction of torque could cause the head(s) to impact the platter(s) with 
more energy than desirable, especially if the head(s) are positioned over data 
areas.   

Sometimes the actuator will not fully park when the drive is last powered off, 
especially if things are already gummy.  That can leave the heads over area of 
the disk where data or servo information is recorded, potentially causing 
damage that may not be repairable (without opening the sealed area), and likely 
ruining part or all of the data on the drive (if you care about what's on it) 
even if the positioner is "unstuck" by the torque.

I have successfully (at least temporarily) resurrected some old Maxtor XT-1140 
(ST-506) drives using this "twist" technique.   My experience shows that the 
technique only works a few times and then it quits working.  Thus, if you do 
get the drive running and care about the data that is on it, before powering it 
up, get it connected up to a system that you can use to reliably archive the 
content, because once you power it back down, it may get stuck worse than it 
was before.

I have not tried "cooking" the drive as also mentioned.  




-Original Message-
From: Tom Hunter via cctalk [mailto:cctalk@classiccmp.org] 
Sent: Friday, February 23, 2024 6:25 PM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts 
Cc: Tom Hunter 
Subject: [cctalk] Re: RD54 Maxtor XT-2190 w/one long meep

It may be that the voice coil positioner is stuck due to some hardened grease.
If that is the case, you could try holding the drive in your hand and flick 
your wrist hard several times to try to dislodge a possibly stuck voice coil.
Alternatively you could flick the drive against something soft like your thigh 
or a rubber mat.
Finally you could try to gently heat the drive to about 60 degrees C and then 
immediately before cooling connect it up to exercise the now hopefully loosened 
voice coil mechanism.

On Sat, Feb 24, 2024 at 8:15 AM Jacob Ritorto via cctalk < 
cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote:

> On Fri, 23 Feb 2024 at 19:01, r.stricklin via cctalk < 
> cctalk@classiccmp.org>
> wrote:
>
> > voice coil positioner.
>
>
> Yikes, so that's an "open the lid" situation, bear?  Any "how to" 
> advise / docs / anecdotes out there as I begin searching?
>

[cctalk] Re: Intel 4004

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Steve Lewis wrote:



> then like the 4004, we're struggling to find evidence of actual products that

> made use of them.  Wasn't the 4004 used in some cash registers, street 
> lights, or > some weighing machines? (I don't have any specific references, 
> just recollections > from past reading)



The major (and primary reason for the 4004 and the MCS-4 family existing in the 
first place) was Nippon Calculating Machine Co and their Busicom 141-PF 
electronic printing desktop calculator.   NCM went to the US looking for a 
chipmaker (the capability for the level of integration required to make such a 
chipset did not exist in production form anywhere else in the world at the 
time), and two companies were engaged to develop a chipset for NCM, one being 
Intel, and the other being Computer Design Corporation.



As history clearly points out, Intel won the competition, developing a chipset 
based on the 4004 CPU, and some peripheral chips (RAM, ROM, I/O) that ended up 
being the operating element of the NCM/Busicom 141-PF

Calculator.



The 141-PF is a very famous calculator for this reason, but is otherwise (by 
appearance and function) a very ordinary calculator for the time.  The fact 
that it had "Intel Inside" (though the term didn't exist at the time), using 
the world's first commercially available microprocessor chipset made with MOS 
Large Scale Integration technology, makes the 141-PF (and the OEM copies; the 
NCR 18-36 and the Unicom 141).  Two versions of the machine were made, one that 
was a four-function machine, and another that added an extra ROM that added a 
square root function.



Other devices were subsequently developed that used the 4004 as their computing 
core, such as digital scales, electronic cash registers, and various other 
electronic devices.



This was only possible because initially, Nippon Calculating Machine Co. had 
exclusive rights to the use of the chipset.   Due to some financial 
difficulties, NCM renegotiated the contract with Intel, removing the 
exclusivity clause in return for Intel forgiving some money owed on the 
development of the chips.  This allowed Intel to sell the chipset to the open 
market.  Once this occurred, Intel aggressively marketed the chipset as the 
MCS-4 microprocessor system, providing extensive documentation, development 
tools, both hardware and software, and lots of support for anyone wishing to 
develop an electronic system based on the 4004.



The Busicom 141-PF calculator and its OEM versions were the first 
commercially-available electronic devices that had a general-purpose 
microprocessor with firmware implementing the machine’s logic, and thus 
represent the historical benchmark.



These were actual products that were sold under the Busicom brand as well as 
NCR and Unicom. It isn’t known how many of these machines were actually made, 
but enough were made that they can still (rarely, though) be found today.  
Nippon Calculating Machine Co. in Japan manufactured and distributed them under 
their Busicom brand name, as well as providing the machines with subtly changed 
color schemes for cabinet/keyboard to OEM customers, which would market, sell, 
and service them under their own brand names.



Rick

--

The Old Calculator Museum

https://oldcalculatormuseum.com



P.S. If anyone out there has one of these calculators lying around gathering 
dust, working or not, and would like to have it see new life as part of a 
museum exhibit, please get in touch with me.

[cctalk] Re: Intel 4004

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

The F14 flight control (CADC) computer was a chipset, with different functional 
aspects built into each chip.  The design was done by Garrett AirResearch.  The 
requirements of the system were quite arduous, and thus the computer was 
reasonably powerful for its time, especially considering its size and power 
supply requirements.  Once the logic was all tried and true via bread boarding 
the system,
The logic was given to American Micro-systems, Inc., (AMI) who laid out and 
fabricated the chips.  At the time, AMI was one of the few companies that could 
make large scale MOS ICs.   AMI did a lot of secret work for the US Government 
which is how it got its start in MOS LSI, and a lot of AMI's early history is 
somewhat shrouded in mystery because most of the work they did was secret.  

It appears that AMI's first MOS LSI calculator chipset was for Smith Corona 
Marchant (SCM), with an eight-chip set that was partitioned into two ROMs, a 
control chip that decoded the microcode in the ROMs into control signals, a 
digit parallel, serial in/out ALU, an input processing IC for scanning the 
keyboard, de-bouncing, and generating more signals going to the microcode 
control chip, an output chip that took in serial data representing a digit, 
decoded the BCD into 1-of-10 signals, sent that out to the common Nixie bus, 
and also strobed the appropriate digit, as well as keeping track of decimal 
point information, a register chip that contained three 68-bit serial-in/serial 
out (with perhaps one position 4-bit parallel out) shift registers that 
represented the storage for the working registers of the calculator, and 
lastly, a data routing chip that took care of gating serial data streams 
to/from the register chip, ALU chip, and output chip.

Technically, this chipset was kind of a 4-bit micro-coded engine that was 
microprogrammed to operate as a calculator, but with different I/O chips and 
microcode, it could have been micro-coded to be a small, general-purpose 
four-bit processor.

The resulting calculator(s), the SCM Cogito 414 (introduced first on 
23-April-1969), and it's little brother, the SCM Cogito 412 (identical chipset 
including ROMs, but has a jumper on the main board that limits the machine to 
12 digits versus the 414's 14 digits - and introduced a bit later to allow 
sales of the 14-digit version to ramp up before introducing a lower-cost model 
with two fewer digits).   

Was that chipset developed for SCM a microprocessor chipset? That's really 
tough to say one way or the other.  It could have fairly easily been turned 
into a small general purpose (probably decimal based rather than binary) 
computer with some different I/O chips and microcode, but does that count as a 
microprocessor, either as-is, or with modifications?

There was also a chipset that was developed by an individual entrepreneur that 
was intended to function as the compute engine for a small portable computer.  

At the moment, I can't recall the name of the person.  He claimed his design 
was truly the first "CPU on a chip".  It had all of the requisite bits (excuse 
pun) in the design to make it a full processor.At some point fairly 
recently, after arguing his case for many years, it went to court, with his 
claim being that he beat Texas Instruments to implementation.  TI had their 
single-chip microprogrammed "calculator" processor that only needed display 
drive electronics, an external clock generator, and a keyboard.  The claim was 
that the chip that this guy had developed was a complete CPU, whereas the TI 
chip, in order to do anything other than serve as a calculator (with different 
mask-programmed microcode) would require additional support ICs to do anything 
really useful as a computer.  A major point of the decision was that the 
engineer had some of the core CPU chips and determined that one of them was 
still working, and built a small demonstration computer using it.   It was 
slow, but had a full keyboard and a LCD display and could do simple 
application-like functions.   

The court sided on the independent guy, although it was a very contentious 
decision.  I'm sorry I don't have the details of this at hand at the moment, 
but there was quite a splash in the technical media regarding this decision.   
At least for now, as far as patent law is concerned, this was the first single 
chip microprocessor.

So, technically, the CADC chipset for the F-14 was very likely the first 
general-purpose processor implemented in MOS on a reasonably small number of 
chips.  The machine was a 20-bit machine, and had to do a lot of math, very 
quickly, so its math functions were heavily optimized for the types of 
calculators necessary for positioning the control surfaces of the F-14 in a 
"fly-by-wire" environment.  There were dedicated multiplier and divider chips 
to do these calculations in hardware as quickly as possible.

So, in some ways, the CADC, while it could likely be micro-coded to o

[cctalk] Re: The World Wide Web

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Mike wrote:
...
Gawd, I still remember those numbers, some 60 years later; so why can't I 
remember my thirty-year old cell phone number...

Because you rarely, if ever, call it.  ;-)

[cctalk] Re: NS32k software on Ebay

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Mattis Lind wrote:


>There have been a number of Ebay listings for various ns32k software, QIC 
>tapes and 1/2 inch tapes. >I thought I would buy them if there were no other 
>bids to try to recover the contents.



...



>But there was a buyer and I didn't want to fight over something where I don't 
>have the actual >hardware. Maybe someone here is the buyer? I am just curious 
>if this will end up on bitsavers in the >future?


I would certainly be interested in what's on the tapes, especially those that 
are specifically ns32k related. My difficulty at the moment is funding to buy 
the stuff due to illness that has severely curtailed my working hours, and 
thus, putting a squeeze on finances. So, I won't be bidding on the tapes. :-(



I have the ability to read ½” tapes (up to 6250 BPI) as well as QIC tapes.

My difficulty at the moment is funding to purchase the stuff due to illness 
that has severely curtailed my working hours, and thus, putting a squeeze on 
finances. So, I won't be bidding on any of the media, but certainly am 
interested in what's on the media.



I would volunteer to read the media and provide it in a form usable (e.g., 
provided external hard drive) if someone purchases the media but doesn’t have 
the tools to read/extract the data on the tapes, and is willing to send them to 
me.



After everything possible is extracted and archived into a usable form on more 
current hardware(disk, large thumb drive, or I could put it up on a private FTP 
for download), I'd return the tapes to their owner along with the extracted 
data in whatever form desired.



Hopefully Mattis or someone else with a preservationist mindset will end up 
winning the tapes.



Bottom line is that the most important thing is that these tapes don't 
disappear into some personal collection of stuff that will never again see the 
light of day (or worse, end up being used as media for overwriting with other 
stuff).  The best possible outcome in my mind would be for the contents to be 
put up on Bitsavers for anyone who has interest to peruse/download.



My concern is copyright.   With the laws the way they are, if the content on 
the tape has copyright notices (or the labels themselves do), it may not be 
legal to make the content public without obtaining some kind of legal release 
from National Semiconductor to publish this obsolete material, which could be a 
somewhat arduous process.   Definitely something to consider if the desire is 
to make the content of the tapes public.   I will still help anyone with 
extraction of the data from the tapes for their personal (non-public) use if 
copyright gets in the way of publishing it for public access.



Anyway, if I can be of assistance in reading/extracating the media, feel free 
to contact me via Email at 
xric...@ybenseney.comz  (remove the X's Y's, and 
Z's).



-Rick

[cctalk] Re: Silly question about S-100 and video monitors

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Chuck wrote:

> The terminal consisted of a leadscrew-fed printing head with a vertical 
> typewheel rotating 
> perpendicular to the (tractor-feed) paper.  Said typewheel was in contact 
> with an ink-soaked felt 
> wheel.  Carriage return was accomplished via a large spring.   Utter 
> steampunk simplicity.

This alphanumeric printer was an extension of the printer internally developed 
by Friden for its first line of printing electronic calculators, the Friden 
115x series.

See my online exhibit for one of the 115x calculators, the 1152 at 
https://oldcalculatormuseum.com/friden1152.html

These kind of sucked because of there actually was an intermediate "print wheel 
inker" drum between the ink-soaked cartridge-loaded ink-source, and the wheel.  
This intermediate wheel was made of a rubber compound that both A) degraded due 
to solvent in the ink, and B) degraded due to rubber's usual degradation due to 
ozone in the atmosphere.  In time, this intermediate roller turned into a wad 
of black, sticky goo that clogged up the works of the printer.   I have a 
number of Friden 115x calculators where this has happened, and replacing that 
roller is not easy to do, as it's a very precise diameter.   I am pretty sure 
that the alphanumeric version of this printer (which Singer/Friden also sold to 
OEM customers...not sure if they had many takers) had the same intermediate 
drum that acted to transfer the ink from the ink roll to the print wheel.   In 
theory, it was kind of a neat design. In practice, it sucked.One thing that 
was interesting is that the characters on the print wheel were organized in a 
helical form to help offset the fact that that the carriage motion was constant 
(it didn't stop when the hammer was fired).   The print wheel for an 
alphanumeric version was larger in diameter to allow for the extra characters 
beyond those used in a printing calculator.

[cctalk] Re: Friden (was Silly question about S-100 and video monitors)

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Just to add, interestingly, Singer also purchased General Precision from 
Librascope. 
Librascope/General Precision were the folks that had earlier acquired 
Royal-McBee.  Royal-McBee developed the wonderful (some consider the first 
"personal" computer) LGP-30 vacuum-tube, magnetic drum computer that was 
designed by Manhattan Project theoretical physicist Stanley Frankel.

Frankel had quite a legacy in the world of computing, having contributed to the 
design of the delay-line-based Packard Bell PB-250(with Max Palevsky), and 
development of a custom high-speed computer for Continental Oil Company called 
CONAC (used for data reduction of sounding operations search for oil deposits). 
 

Frankel also developed an early electronic calculator design that was purchased 
by Smith Corona/Marchant (SCM) and produced as the CRT-display SCM Cogito 240 
calculator, augmented with Square Root as to Cogito 240SR. 

Frankel also collaborated with SCM on the development of the logic for the 
first set of LSI integrated circuits that were used in the later Nixie-tube 
display Cogito calculators.   

He also developed a very interesting calculator, based somewhat on the 
principles of the LGP-30 computer for Diehl in West Germany.   The machine was 
fully transistorized and used only 142 transistors in its logic.  It was based 
on magnetostrictive delay lines (two of them), and was a fully microcoded 
architecture, I believe the first electronic calculator to be completely 
microcoded.

Since read-only memory (for the microcode) was either physically very large, or 
complex and expensive to build at the time (diode ROM, wire rope ROM), the 
microcode was loaded into the calculator at power-up time from a two channel 
punched metal tape.   One channel provided the clocking, and the other channel 
provided the bits.   

It took just under a minute from when the calculator was powered on until the 
microcode was loaded into a delay line, and from there, all operations of the 
machine were controlled by the microcode in the delay line. 

The machine was able to be implemented with so few transistors because the 
microcode word was quite wide, and was designed so that it was sequentially 
interpreted as the bits streamed out of the delay line, so not all that many 
flip flops were needed.  Working registers were stored in the other delay line, 
along with program steps (yes, the machine was programmable).   

The design was very elegant.The machine debuted as the Diehl Combitron, and 
the cool thing about its design was that it was really easy to augment by just 
changing the microcode tape (which was quite easily done...bugfixes could be 
easly installed even by end-users, though such was discouraged).   

Soon after the Combitron was introduced, an augmented version was introduced 
called the Combitron-S that added a small amount of  I/O circuitry and 
additional microcode to implement operations to allow the addition of an 
external punched paper tape reader/punch.

An interesting aspect of electronic calculator history is that there are a 
number of people whose names pop up at various points in time during the 
evolution of the technology.  Frankel was one of those, along with a cast of a 
few others, all of whom had major impacts in the realm of electronic calculator 
(and the eventual evolution of the electronic calculator into what became the 
microcontroller/microprocessor that spurred the development of the personal 
computer).

[cctalk] Re: Silly question about S-100 and video monitors

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Tony wrote:

> Didn't Singer own Friden (or at least the name) at one point? I am sure I've 
> seen calculators 
> batched(sic) 'Singer Friden'). 

Yup.  In July of 1963, Singer announced its intent to purchase Friden.  The 
deal closed in October.

It was all a part of a larger diversification move on the part of Singer that 
began in the early 1960's.

Friden employees in general were not at all happy about the acquisition, 
especially those in design and engineering.   

Fortunately, the Singer management was far away, and only made occasional 
visits.   But, as is inevitable, the important Friden culture started to be 
eroded.   

Singer effectively began the death of internal electronic calculator 
development at Friden when it quietly started selling the transistorized Friden 
1112 electronic calculator, which was made in Japan by Hitachi, purchased under 
a temporary OEM agreement between Singer and Hitachi.   

The 1112 was an experiment to see how well the machine sold.  It did reasonably 
well, and that was enough for Singer to slowly begin to dismantle the Friden 
electronic calculator development operation, and start selling OEM-acquired 
(from Hitachi initially) calculators under the Singer/Friden badge.   

The Friden 1154 electronic printing programmable calculator was the last 
fully-Friden-designed & built electronic calculator developed.  

The later Friden 1155 was a design that was farmed out to an independent 
design/development company, which was told to re-use as much from the 1154 as 
possible.  After that, all of the calculators were acquired under OEM 
agreements from other companies, and by that time, most of the brain trust that 
made Friden's wonderful and unusual electronic calculators had left.   

In the fall of 1975, Singer shuttered all Friden operations, ending the legacy 
of Friden.


 

[cctalk] Re: NGPL TCS - 1969 Industrial Control

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Eric Moore wrote: 
> Super stoked to be able to share my latest video, I hope yall like it.

This brings back memories for me.  

Except the gas line control computer (it didn't run gas turbines like this 
system did, but it monitored gas line pressures and would open and close 
distribution valves based to equalize pressures throughout the system) was 
considerably earlier than the SEL 810.   

The machine was made by 3M (Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing), and was all 
transistorized and had main memory of a magnetic drum instead of magnetic core. 
 The CPU was designed in 1963, and the two CPUs in this system were 
manufactured in 1965.  

The control system was quite similar with magnetic latching relays to maintain 
state in event of power outage, and lots of A/D and D/A converters and relay 
controls and digital I/Os.   

The CPU was redundant, there were two of the CPUs that could talk to each other 
through a single hardware handshake register.  If one machine failed, the other 
would take over, in a master/slave relationship.

The control system had a Parabam transistorized digital clock using projection 
displays instead of Nixies with BCD readout, and it had a bank of BCD-encoded 
thumbwheel switches for setting various parameters.  The console was a 33ASR 
Teletype, and it had a large-carriage IBM typebar-type typewriter (not 
Seletric-based) that it used for printing out the logs.  The IBM had a tractor 
feed for standard green-bar printer paper.   

This machine was donated to our high school after it had been replaced by newer 
technology.   The I/O lines going out to the remote stations were chopped, much 
like the cable you showed.  We had to make sure there were no shorts caused by 
the chopping of the cables before we could power anything up.   

It all worked, except the drum on the "B" computer had some bad spots on it, so 
these areas had to be avoided.  Eventually, that drum crashed (bearing 
failure), rendering the B computer unusable, but the A computer's drum was very 
solid and worked well.   

The CPU had a 24-bit word, used sign-magnitude math, and each instruction had a 
pointer to the next instruction to be executed.   If there was an operand to be 
fetched, its address was also included in the instruction.   Branches coded two 
next instruction locations, one if the condition as true, and the other if 
false.   To optimize the speed of the machine, the operand and next-instruction 
addresses had to account for drum rotation to minimize time waiting for the 
drum to make another rotation.

The system was built in to a big desk, with the CPUs below like a filing 
cabinet, the console on the table top with the clock and thumbwheel switches, 
and a Mallory Sonalert that could be programmatically turned on for alarm 
conditions.   The IBM logging typewriter set off to the side on the tabletop.  
There was a standard 19" equipment rack located at one end of the tabletop that 
contained all of the relays, digital I/Os, and A/D and D/A converters.   

The CPUs were not terribly fast, being completely bit-serial in nature.   
Writing optimal code to print out a character string pre-stored on the drum on 
the console Teletype could not drive the TTY at full speed, probably about 8.5 
to 9 characters per second maximum.  I did have a hardware-based loader, 
though, that could read addresses and data in octal at full TTY speed from the 
paper tape reader.  

I wrote a FOCAL interpreter for the thing (based on DEC's FOCAL for the PDP-8). 
  When you'd enter a line of program code (e.g.,  1.02 ASK A) and hit RETURN, 
the machine would churn for approximately 4 seconds before it'd spit out a 
linefeed acknowledging that the syntax was reasonable and the line was stored 
in memory.   The floating point math was very slow (it did not have hardware 
integer multiply/divide, so all of the math had to be done using integer 
add/subtract).   Entering "TYPE 2+2" and pressing return out take about 15 
seconds to print out "=4".   

It was an exercise in programming, not effectiveness as a programming tool for 
the machine.  It was quite educational writing re-entrant and recursive code on 
that machine, were there were no index registers, and no indirect addressing.  
It all had to be done by inline instruction modification.   

Despite the limits of the machine, it successfully and reliably managed the 
flow of natural gas through the various distribution networks around the region 
for about 10 years before it was replaced by, I believe, a process-control 
computer system developed by General Electric.

Thanks for your nice video on this great old system that had a similar role 
back in the day!

Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
https://oldcalculatormuseum.com
Beavercreek, Oregon  USA

[cctalk] Re: VCF Southwest 2023 some highlights

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Tony D. wrote:


> I may be talking nonsense, but you describe the Tektronix 4054 as a 
> 6800-based system. I 
> thought the 4051 used that processor, but the 4052 and 4054 used a board of 
> AM2900-series
> bitslice chips that implement a processor with an instruction set similar to 
> the 6800
> but with no BCD operations and some 16 bit extensions.

No nonsense at all, Tony.  You are correct.  The architecture of the 4052 and 
4054 were definitely bitslice microcoded implementations of the 6800 CPU, with 
the omissions and additions as you mentioned.

The memory architecture of these computers was also heavily modified to allow 
bank switching of RAM and ROM programmatically to create an address space that 
provided more memory capacity than the 64K address space of the 6800 used in 
the 4051.   

The display subsystem was also modified to allow additions of graphics 
co-processors for doing things like display list processing and refresh vector 
graphics which were drawn at a lower intensity so that the vectors would not be 
stored on the screen.Later, a special CRT was made for the 4054 that had a 
unique storage CRT that had two layers, a green layer and a yellow/orange layer 
of phosphor that could be triggered by different beam intensities, both in 
storage and "write-through" mode that allowed three-color (yellow/orange, 
green, and a mix of the two IIRC), refreshed vector graphics at up to 1000 
vectors per second.Still, it was just fast enough for simple animated 
graphics for things like games and graphical editors that would use refresh 
graphics for placing an object, then writing it in storage mode once it was 
placed.

The special three-color tube was not available in the 4052, only the 4054, but 
the add-on boards for providing the vector write-thru display were compatible 
with the 4052.

The microcoded CPU and improved memory architecture of the 4052/4054 made the 
machines significantly faster at compute-bound tasks.  I/O and display were not 
sped up much by the new architecture, as the speed at which vectors and text 
could be written to the storage tube display was limited by the tube itself, so 
graphics intensive stuff wasn't all that much faster than the 4051.   If the 
graphics involved computing the vectors in real-time, that type of graphics 
would be faster on the 4052/4054 due to the significantly faster computing 
speed of the 2901-based 6800 "clone/extension".   Things like GPIB I/O were 
more limited by the peripheral devices than the CPU itself, so things like I/O 
to the GPIB 4907 8" floppy disc drives, wasn't all that much faster.

I have a 4051 and a 4052A, both working.   Comparing them side-to-side doing 
compute bound things (like finding prime numbers) clearly shows the speed 
advantage of the bit-slice architecture in the 4052.   Drawing "canned" 
graphics is slightly faster on the 4052 simply because the interpretation of 
the BASIC code that does the drawing runs significantly faster, which does make 
a small, but noticeable difference in the time it takes to render an image, 
with the 4052A finishing any given drawing a bit sooner than the 4051.   Floppy 
disc access on the 4907 doesn't seem to be much faster other than the faster 
speed of interpretation of the BASIC program, with the actual speed of 
reading/writing being about the same due mostly to the speed of GPIB 
transactions, and the fixed rate that data is read/written to the floppy.

The 4050-series computers were quite amazing for their time.  Nothing else 
except hugely expensive graphics systems that ran on minicomputers, such as 
those made by Evans & Sutherland and others, could exceed the capabilities of 
the 4050-series machines (especially the 4052 and 4054), and the 4050-series 
machines fit on a desktop and were (other than being rather heavy) relatively 
portable, very easy to use/program, and cost dramatically less than anything 
else.

DVST was a great technology at a time when large amounts of high-speed random 
access memory was very expensive.   Magnetic core that was fast enough was 
quite expensive and complex, and IC-based RAM was just beginning to have 
reasonable capacity, but still ran somewhat slowly, and was also initially 
quite expensive.As the price of fast, high-capacity IC-based RAM came down, 
raster type display systems with bitmapped display memory, and even dedicated 
blitter hardware for shifting bits around in display memory, made 
cost-effective machines with at least equivalent (monochrome) display 
capability in terms of resolution, along with everything (including characters) 
being refreshed graphics straight out of the framebuffer RAM.   Once that 
occurred, the market for DVST shrunk quite dramatically.  Desktop workstations 
(like Sun, Apollo, Perq, etc.) with graphics capabilities that met or exceeded 
those of the 4050-series quickly took the place of these watershed machines.

-Rick
--
Rick Bensene, Curator
The Old Calculator (and some co

[cctalk] Re: Getting floppy images to/from real floppy disks.

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Earlier today, I wrote:

>> Doubtful that VW Bug was on the Autobahn at the time, and, while the 
>> advertisement was very
>> novel with a full-on minicomputer in the back seat of a VW Bug, the amount 
>> of data
>> potentially being transported was likely only 4K 12-bit words, or 48K bits.

>> Since the machine had magnetic core memory, the system would retain the 
>> content of its memory
>> without power, so in this scenario, the VM Bug was actually capable moving 
>> data from one
>> point to another, albeit, not all that much data.

>> Now, if the Bug had a trailer hitch, it could tow a trailer behind it with a 
>> gasoline or
>> diesel powered generator with sufficient capacity to run the PDP-8.   If 
>> that were the case,
>> the machine could actually process the data in its memory while it was 
>> moving down the
>> road...something a station wagon full of reels of magnetic tape wouldn't be 
>> able to do.

To which David Barto replied:

> Are you suggesting some kind of, say, portable computer?

> Runs, dodging and weaving.

I'm not sure that you could fit a complete Model 33-ASR Teletype in the 
passenger seat of 
the Bug. I suppose if the Teletype was removed from its stand, it might be able 
to sit on the
seat, and be powered by the same generator that runs the Straight-8.   The 
Straight-8 came with a 110-baud current-loop serial I/O interface, so it'd just 
be a matter of cabling it up to the Teletype.

It'd be really hard to operate the machine while driving, for sure.   It'd be 
far worse than messing with a smartphone while driving :-/.  But, once stopped 
somewhere pleasant, you could
actually develop programs using the punched tape reader/punch on the 33ASR.  
It'd definitely be
an example of early "mobile computing". (Tongue firmly in cheek).   

[cctalk] Re: Getting floppy images to/from real floppy disks.

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

> 
>> yes.  a Kombi full of tapes hurtling down the highway.
> 
> ...down the Autobahn.


Ben F. wrote regarding transport of data in a moving vehicle:

>  the Autobahn...
> https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/artifact/331/1893

Doubtful that VW Bug was on the Autobahn at the time, and, while the 
advertisement was very novel with a full-on minicomputer in the back seat of a 
VW Bug, the amount of data potentially being transported was likely only 4K 
12-bit words, or 48K bits.

Since the machine had magnetic core memory, the system would retain the content 
of its memory without power, so in this scenario, the VM Bug was actually 
capable moving data from one point to another, albeit, not all that much data.

Now, if the Bug had a trailer hitch, it could tow a trailer behind it with a 
gasoline or diesel powered generator with sufficient capacity to run the PDP-8. 
  If that were the case, the machine could actually process the data in its 
memory while it was moving down the road...something a station wagon full of 
reels of magnetic tape wouldn't be able to do.

[cctalk] Re: Typing class in high school

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

>> 
>> And, yes, even as a male I had typing in high school.
>> 
> 
> I had typing as an elective class in 7th grade in 1984. It gave me the
> ability to type in programs faster.
> 

I took typing class in High School all four years.

Because I had developed an interest in typing when I was much younger, one of 
my relatives had given me an old Royal typewriter when I was something like 6 
years old.  

I was proficient with the alphabet and had a pretty good vocabulary for my age, 
so I started to use the typewriter to write out my ideas for various inventions 
that I thought up(most of which were completely impossible, but I actually did 
make some of them).

Of course, I typed in a way that was  my own creation.   It was at first hunt 
and peck, and evolved as I got more familiar with the layout of the keyboard 
into my own version of touch typing. 

I started using a Teletype 33ASR in sixth grade for learning programming on the 
HP 2000C timeshared BASIC system that the county school system owned, and the 
familiarity with a typewriter keyboard meant that I got pretty good at typing 
on the Teletype - being able to type on it about as fast as the mechanism would 
allow.  

Since the vocabulary for typing in BASIC programs was fairly limited, my 
fingers got muscle memory on the various keywords and I could rip them out such 
that the interlock on the keyboard held back the pressure of the finger to type 
the next character in a keyword that when the mechanism finished printing, that 
key would immediately be depressed. About the only place I slowed down a little 
was typing literal text in PRINT statements, math expressions, and print 
formats in IMAGE statements.

By the time I got to the High School typing class, I could easily type 70-80 
WPM with very low error rates for extended periods of time, and could burst up 
to 110WPM.  But, I typed in a way that was completely incorrect as far as the 
formal way of typing goes.

After the first few weeks of class, it became apparent to the instructor that I 
could type quite well, as well as quite quickly, but I did it all wrong.   I 
was the second fastest typist in the class (there was a girl in the class who 
was faster), but I had the lowest error rate in sustained high-speed typing.

The teacher was a great guy.   He was constantly on me to type the right way 
out of due diligence, but didn't press it, and I'd constantly ignore him.

He would stand over me and watch me type, and would shake his head in both 
disgust, and in marvel that I could type as fast as I did using a completely 
bizarre method.  He often told me that it was a wonder that I didn't tie my 
fingers into knots typing the way that I did.

When it came time to grade my performance in the class, he was torn.  He told 
me that he wanted to give me a failing grade because I did not learn the proper 
way to type, but at the same time because I could type all of the material very 
accurately and quickly, he could not help but give me an A because I performed 
better than the vast majority of the students in the class despite the bizarre 
way that I typed. 

I still use this strange way of typing to this day (many decades later), and 
can still type pretty darned fast, although my error rate has crept up quite a 
bit due to arthritis in my fingers, as well as general neurological degradation 
due to age.  It works for me, and in the end, I got all As in typing class for 
all four years.  I took the class after my Freshman year even though it was no 
longer required (it was required for all students to pass at least one year of 
typing in order to graduate, which was quite forward-thinking for those days) 
because I really liked the teacher, and the practice was good for keeping my 
speed up and error rate down, which proved very helpful for writing papers 
later on in High School, as well as in my computer programming classes and work 
after I graduated.

It's always interesting to study the unusual methods that get used when people 
(especially young people) come up with their own ways of doing things out of 
interest or necessity versus what is the traditionally-trained way.   

I think in a lot of cases as people get into the school systems, their unique 
ways of doing things get trained out of them, even though their unique methods 
had evolved into a superior means of accomplishing something.   

I had a great deal of respect for this typing teacher for realizing that my 
unique way of typing worked very well for me, didn't affect the results of what 
was required, and thus left me alone and didn't try to force the "correct" way 
on me.

It is unfortunate that the insight that this teacher had is not more common in 
the educational realm.

RIP Al Yanzic!

-Rick
--
Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
https://oldcalculatormuseum.com
Beavercreek, Oregon

[cctalk] Re: HP Computer Museum update

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

David Collins wrote:
>> 
>> This will bring to a close my role in maintaining Jon's legacy in HP
>> computing.  It's been a privilege to be responsible for the collection and
>> the website and to see the value they bring to the vintage computing
>> community.

To which Doc Shipley replied:

> This is a huge thing. I cannot imagine how much time and energy you've 
> invested making this happen.

> Congratulations on a successful transition, and thank you so very much 
> for your efforts!

Doc's words are most heartily seconded by me.   

Preserving this collection is so important.  Knowing that it is becoming a part 
of HP's corporate archive hopefully assures that it will all be well cared-for, 
as well as documented and shared in the decades to come.

Thank you, David, for all of your efforts to make this happen.   It had to be a 
monumental task to make all of the arrangements, not to mention simply 
maintaining it all for the years after Jon's passing.

Most sincerely,

-Rick
--
Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com
Beavercreek, Oregon  USA

[cctalk] Re: Bendix G-15 Restoration

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Paul wrote:
>> modify a lot of the software. Timing dependencies aside, G-15
instructions 
>> didn't have addresses -- they had "timing numbers" that effectively
told the 
>> hardware how long to wait before reading or writing a word on the
drum.

To which Christian replied:

> Oh really, that is then similar to the addressing scheme of the Diehl 
> Combitron (a marvelous design by Stanley Frankel).

Indeed, the old drum computers generally had timing information in the
instruction set that gave the optimal
sector on the drum for the operand address, and the next instruction
address.   

We had an old computer at our high school computer lab (1974-ish) that
was designed in the mid-1960's by 3M (the scotch tape company) that was
originally a real-time monitor and data reduction system for a natural
gas distribution system and was donated to the school when it was
retired.

The machine had two CPUs that ran in tandem with the ability to detect a
fault in one, and switch to the other.
The CPUs had 24-bit words, and each had 8K words of magnetic drum
memory.They were discrete transistor-based machines and were
bit-serial in architecture.   An instruction like ADD that operated on
an operand to add to the accumulator would have information in the
instruction set reference that said "for optimal programming,
operand=N+3, next instruction=N+6".
The assembler (which was slow!), called SOAP, tried to optimize, but for
a lot of things like list processing and such, it really couldn't do
much to help.   Tables and lists had to be scattered all over the drum
for the best speed, and that got kind of difficult because the operand
address only had room for a sector number.  If the reference was on a
different track, you had to prefix the instruction with a modifier
instruction that would specify the block and track for the operand (and
next instruction if needed).   There were no index registers, so the
only way to do calculated data fetches or branches was to load the
instruction base into the accumulator, then modify it using math
operations to calculate the correct sector, then store the accumulator
at the address specified by the next instruction address to execute it.
It was crazy fun learning it, but in practice, even trying really hard
to optimize the code, it could barely drive a Teletype 33ASR to full 10
character-per-second maximum speed.It had a bunch of I/O stuff,
including a Parabam transistorized real-time clock that could be read by
the computer, a bank of thumbwheel switches that could be read in BCD
form, and a whole rack full of A/D (discrete transistor) converters,
digital counters, analog outputs, and digital relay outputs that were
used for the original data acquisition I/O, but the cables going into
them were just chopped off, and I never played with any of that other
than to write code to click the relays in pseudo-random patterns to make
a noise like the machine was "calculating".

Speaking of the Diehl Combitron, it was indeed an amazing transistorized
(with only something like ~130 transistors in total) calculator designed
by the genius of Stan Frankel (who also designed the transistorized
Smith-Corona/Marchant (SCM) Cogito 240/240SR calculator (which was way
too slow due to SCM requiring the use of cheap slow-switching diodes),
the Royal McBee/Librascope/General Precision LGP-30 vacuum-tube drum
computer, as well as consulted in the design of the delay line-based
Packard Bell PB-250.

The Combitron was an amazing microcoded bit-serial processor designed in
around '63-'64 by Frankel.  It was user-programmable (but not user
microprogrammable, unless...).ROM for storing the microcode was a
difficult thing back then, generally taking quite a bit of space (not
really practical for a desktop calculator) and were labor-intensive and
expensive to build.  

How did Frankel store the microcode for the Combitron?  

On a punched stainless steel tape that was optically read a bit at a
time at power-up into a delay line.  Once the microcode was loaded, the
tape would rewind and the microcode engine would start up reading its
instructions out of the delay line.  Hence the addressing scheme  in the
microcode to make it as fast as possible. The addressing scheme
accounted for the delay time for processing a microcode function such
that the next micro-instruction would be right at the output tap of the
delay line when it was needed.   

It takes about a minute for the microcode to load when the machine is
powered up.  The tape has two channels, one for the clock, and another
for the microcode bits.

By the way, an end-user could presumably write custom microcode for the
calculator if they had the microcode documentation and a way to punch
the stainless steel tape.  Possible, but not terribly practical.

Loading the microcode from a reel of punched metal tape made firmware
updates possible by replacing the tape.  I do not know if there were
different versions of the microcode for the Combitron 

RE: Ok, Perqs are stowed away

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

On the Classic Computer Mailing list, you wrote:

> Anyone need more of these Sun3/4 VME boards? Need to make more space.

Hi, Chris,

I didn't see the boards...which photo(s) are they in?   I have a Sun 4 server 
system, and there are some boards I've been looking for.   If I could see what 
you've got, I could determine if you've got any of the ones I'm seeking.
I looked through the pix, but didn't see any photos of anything but the Perq 
stuff, which is way cool...congrats on having some cool machines.

Thanks,
-Rick
--
Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
http://oldcalculatormsueum.com

RE: Unknown Intel blinkenlight panel circa 1973

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Josh R. wrote:

> I recently bought a mystery blinkenlight panel. Closer inspection reveals it 
> was manufactured by Intel in the early 70’s (1973), and some people on the 
> book of faces suggested it was part of a “device 
> multiplexer”(?)

> I’m hoping someone here might be able to shed some light on this mystery.

I suspect from looking it over, and given that Intel's early business was 
primarily random access static and dynamic memory ICs, that this was the 
console of some kind of memory test system.

I don't know for sure, though, it's just a guess.  
I took the upside down image, flipped it, and did some image enhancement on it 
to make out the legends on the indicators and switches.  Based on what I see, 
my suspicion seems plausible.

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

RE: Duplicate messages

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Johan Helsingius wrote:

>Anyone else getting duplicate messages from this list? I get 2 copies of
>most (but not all) messages, with the second copy often arriving
>significantly later.

I experience the same thing.
-Rick

RE: PDF of FANUC TAPE READER A860-0056-T020 Manual Wtd.

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Bill D. wrote:
>
> So I thought I'd try my hand at the FANUC TAPE READER A860.  I may need to 
> make a serial cable (?) to connect from
> the internal connector don't know yet.  Or maybe the internal 50-pin port
> from the photos is for the punch.  Don't know yet, thus the need for the
> manual.
>
Fanuc was in the business of making NC and CNC controls for machining centers.  
 
I suspect that Fanuc purchased the paper tape reader assembly through an OEM 
agreement with a peripheral company that specialized in making such devices 
rather than designing one of their own, though it is possible.

You might very carefully look around the unit to see if there are any signs of 
identification of the original equipment manufacturer...a company like Facit, 
Decitek, Friden, Roytron, Digital Equipment, Creed, Teletype, etc.
If you can find out the original manufacturer, it might be easier to find data 
on the tape reader.

-Rick

RE: Mystery 1970 core board

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Al Kossow wrote  Re: Mystery 1970 core board:

>found it in this MAC-16 ad
>https://adspast.com/store/customer/product.php?productid=62927

The MAC-16 in this ad looks odd.  The front panel has nothing behind
it...or at least, very little.   I'm not familiar with the MAC-16, but
either the ad has a mock-up of the machine(seems plausible given the
tendencies of marketing), or the front panel is  a real waste of rack
space.   The electronics appear to be in a box below the front panel,
with only a small area of overlap between the electronics chassis and
the front panel, and nothing but air behind it.   

Is this the way the system was really put together?   

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

RE: IBM Type 31 Alphabetical Duplicating Keypunch available, Seattle area

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Sorrythis was meant to go to just Josh, but accidentally copied to the list.
My apologies.

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


-Original Message-
From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Rick Bensene 
via cctalk
Sent: Tuesday, February 11, 2020 8:26 AM
To: Josh Dersch; General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: RE: IBM Type 31 Alphabetical Duplicating Keypunch available, Seattle 
area

Hi, Josh,

I can't possibly think about getting this wonderful old beast from you, but 
something about the photos captured my curiosity.

In the background of one of the photos (#1, IIRC) is the front panel of what 
appears to be a 12-bit computer (ala PDP 8), but the panel is most decidedly 
not DEC.  It has a label on it that says "BR 2412".It appears that there is 
a second one of these located directly below this panel.  These are in a rack 
that appears to have a PDP 8/e mounted above them.
The question is...what is this "BR 2412" machine?

I have managed to get TSS-8 running on two terminals on my 8/e.   I configured 
a third serial card for current loop and 110 baud to try to get my Teletype 
running on it as a third terminal, but I can't get any response out of it.   I 
did reconfigure TSS-8 for the third terminal.   I think that the problem might 
be the serial board not generating interrupts, and I was just getting going on 
troubleshooting using my trusty Tektronix 2465 scope, when the scope died.   
Something went amiss in the horizontal deflection such that the trace is pushed 
off the left-hand side of the tube.  Beam Finder does put the trace in the 
center of the screen, albeit all squished.   I opened the scope up and checked 
all the connectors and switches, and all else I could think of, but nothing 
made any difference.   Arrggh.   So, then I went to get my old backup, a 465, 
which last I used, worked.  But, something is not right with its high voltage 
supply...the trace slowly fades away over the course of about 5 minutes.  Turn 
it off and let it cool down, and the trace comes back, for a couple of minutes. 
  So, I have no oscilloscope.   I lost interest at that  point, but figure I 
can use the logic analyzer to figure out if the interrupt is being generated 
without too much trouble...just need to get the motivation to fiddle with it.

Complicating things is that about three weeks ago, I woke up in the morning, 
and as I went to get out of bed, I felt something in my lower back twinge, but 
didn't really pay attention to it.  As I went to put my weight on my feet, my 
left leg collapsed, and there was a sharp pain in my lower left back.   From 
that moment on, I've been in extreme pain in my lower back, extending to my 
groin, then down the front side of my left let to the knee.   I called my 
doctor, and went in.  He took XRays and the diagnosis was spinal stenosis 
(narrowing of the spinal cord canal) due to arthritis, as well as a bulging 
disc in the lumbar vertebrae.  All of this is causing a bundle of nerves that 
serve the upper left leg to be pinched, and thus...the pain.  My doctor said 
that in order to figure out treatment, an MRI would be needed.  The insurance 
company denied two requests he made to get the MRI.   I ended up calling the 
insurance company and letting them know that I was both in incredible pain, as 
well as pretty much made immobile by this, and without the MRI, I would not be 
able to be treated, which was unacceptable. The finally relented, and allowed 
the MRI, but this whole escapade took about a week.   Then, getting scheduled 
for the MRI took another five days, and another three days to get the MRI 
reviewed by a spinal specialist.   I was then referred to the spinal 
specialist, and it took four days to get that on the schedule.  I went to that 
appointment, and he said that there were two options, surgery or a combination 
of cortisone and platelet-rich plasma by injection into the affected area.   I 
opted for the injection, as the specialist said in cases like mine that the 
success rate (e.g., relief of the pain) was better than 85%.   Surgery will 
also fix it, but the recovery time is longer, and there are far more chances 
for complications.   I go in tomorrow for the CT-guided injections.   I should 
get relief within 3 to 7 days.  Fingers are crossed it works, and there are no 
complications.

I am still looking for a job.  I had a good prospect week before last, did well 
in a phone screening, and asked to come in for an in-person interview.  
However, I was terribly sleep-deprived, as well as in terrible pain from my 
spine issue when I went in for the in-person interview, and though I had 
thought I did OK (I made no mention of my back issue/pain), apparently it 
wasn't good enough, even though I had tons of experience in the areas they were 
looking for and could prove it, they wrote me on Friday (the intervi

RE: IBM Type 31 Alphabetical Duplicating Keypunch available, Seattle area

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Hi, Josh,

I can't possibly think about getting this wonderful old beast from you, but 
something about the photos captured my curiosity.

In the background of one of the photos (#1, IIRC) is the front panel of what 
appears to be a 12-bit computer (ala PDP 8), but the panel is most decidedly 
not DEC.  It has a label on it that says "BR 2412".It appears that there is 
a second one of these located directly below this panel.  These are in a rack 
that appears to have a PDP 8/e mounted above them.
The question is...what is this "BR 2412" machine?

I have managed to get TSS-8 running on two terminals on my 8/e.   I configured 
a third serial card for current loop and 110 baud to try to get my Teletype 
running on it as a third terminal, but I can't get any response out of it.   I 
did reconfigure TSS-8 for the third terminal.   I think that the problem might 
be the serial board not generating interrupts, and I was just getting going on 
troubleshooting using my trusty Tektronix 2465 scope, when the scope died.   
Something went amiss in the horizontal deflection such that the trace is pushed 
off the left-hand side of the tube.  Beam Finder does put the trace in the 
center of the screen, albeit all squished.   I opened the scope up and checked 
all the connectors and switches, and all else I could think of, but nothing 
made any difference.   Arrggh.   So, then I went to get my old backup, a 465, 
which last I used, worked.  But, something is not right with its high voltage 
supply...the trace slowly fades away over the course of about 5 minutes.  Turn 
it off and let it cool down, and the trace comes back, for a couple of minutes. 
  So, I have no oscilloscope.   I lost interest at that  point, but figure I 
can use the logic analyzer to figure out if the interrupt is being generated 
without too much trouble...just need to get the motivation to fiddle with it.

Complicating things is that about three weeks ago, I woke up in the morning, 
and as I went to get out of bed, I felt something in my lower back twinge, but 
didn't really pay attention to it.  As I went to put my weight on my feet, my 
left leg collapsed, and there was a sharp pain in my lower left back.   From 
that moment on, I've been in extreme pain in my lower back, extending to my 
groin, then down the front side of my left let to the knee.   I called my 
doctor, and went in.  He took XRays and the diagnosis was spinal stenosis 
(narrowing of the spinal cord canal) due to arthritis, as well as a bulging 
disc in the lumbar vertebrae.  All of this is causing a bundle of nerves that 
serve the upper left leg to be pinched, and thus...the pain.  My doctor said 
that in order to figure out treatment, an MRI would be needed.  The insurance 
company denied two requests he made to get the MRI.   I ended up calling the 
insurance company and letting them know that I was both in incredible pain, as 
well as pretty much made immobile by this, and without the MRI, I would not be 
able to be treated, which was unacceptable. The finally relented, and allowed 
the MRI, but this whole escapade took about a week.   Then, getting scheduled 
for the MRI took another five days, and another three days to get the MRI 
reviewed by a spinal specialist.   I was then referred to the spinal 
specialist, and it took four days to get that on the schedule.  I went to that 
appointment, and he said that there were two options, surgery or a combination 
of cortisone and platelet-rich plasma by injection into the affected area.   I 
opted for the injection, as the specialist said in cases like mine that the 
success rate (e.g., relief of the pain) was better than 85%.   Surgery will 
also fix it, but the recovery time is longer, and there are far more chances 
for complications.   I go in tomorrow for the CT-guided injections.   I should 
get relief within 3 to 7 days.  Fingers are crossed it works, and there are no 
complications.

I am still looking for a job.  I had a good prospect week before last, did well 
in a phone screening, and asked to come in for an in-person interview.  
However, I was terribly sleep-deprived, as well as in terrible pain from my 
spine issue when I went in for the in-person interview, and though I had 
thought I did OK (I made no mention of my back issue/pain), apparently it 
wasn't good enough, even though I had tons of experience in the areas they were 
looking for and could prove it, they wrote me on Friday (the interview was last 
Thursday) saying they had picked someone else.   Nothing else on the horizon, 
and finances are not good.   I keep applying for jobs, but either get no 
response at all, or get messages saying "thanks, we'll keep your information on 
file...".It's frustrating.

Anyway, I my curiosity got the best of me when I saw that odd front panel in 
the background and figured I'd drop a quick line your way.

Hope things are going well for you.

-Rick

-Original Message-
From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@cl

The Internet Archive

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Ethan O'Toole wrote:

> We owe a ton of props to the Internet Archive. While they might not
have 
> everything, they have a glimpse into the early days of the internet
and 
> have been at it since early on.

Here here.   I very much second Ethan's sentiments regarding the
Internet Archive.

It's a daunting effort to scrape and store all that information.
Fortunately, deduplication and compression technologies have come  a
long way, and long-term, online storage of large amounts of data
processed as such has become much less expensive due to the huge
decreases in the cost-per-bit of spinning rust.   

Despite all of that, it's still a lot to store, and even with these
technologies, there are costs involved for staffing, servers, as well as
continually adding storage.

Any and all support the Internet Archive can be given is well-deserved,
in my opinion.

Shameless plug:
I make regular donations to the Internet Archive, and right now, they
are have a 2-to-1 matching gift campaign going on due to pledges from
corporate and institutional donors, so if you possibly can make a
donation, head over to https://archive.org and give help support this
valuable /free/ resource.  I just made a $25 donation myself.  Every
little bit helps.

Best wishes for a happy and safe Thanksgiving holiday to all,

-Rick
--
Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
http://oldcalculatormuseum.com
Beavercreek, Oregon   USA

Catatonic Rockwell AIM-65

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Hi, all,

I recently was given a Rockwell AIM-65 single-board computer in nice physical 
condition, with the original keyboard and keyboard connector cable.
I've downloaded all of the documentation that I can find, and have been trying 
to get it running.

After doing a thorough visual inspection looking for any sign of detritus, 
especially anything metallic, as well as making sure all of the ICs were seated 
in the pretty-lame single-wipe sockets, and checking for any obviously cooked 
or overheated components.   

Everything looked really nice, and quite clean.  
All of the required chips were in place, and looked good, including the 6532 
RIOT, 6520 PIA for the display, and two 6522 VIAs.  All of the LSI's, including 
the 6502, were Rockwell-made parts, with date codes all within a reasonable 
time of each other.   

I checked across the +5V and GND power supply connection points, and found that 
it wasn't shorted, another decent sign.

The machine came with all five of the ROM sockets filled with original Rockwell 
ROMs, including the two-ROM BASIC interpreter, the Assembler ROM, as well as 
the two Monitor ROMs, all installed in the sockets they should be installed in. 
   The machine had six 2114's (1024x4 static RAM) installed in the lower three 
banks of user RAM, with two of the sockets unoccupied.  I got two known good 
2114's from my stock of parts and installed them in the two empty sockets, so 
that the machine would be in the 4K of User RAM configuration.

I understand that the machine can be powered up with only the +5V supply, but 
the thermal printer will show as "down", as it requires the +24V supply.  The 
+12/-12 supplies are also not required.   

I made sure that the RESET switch worked properly, and tested the KB/TTY and 
RUN/STEP switches operated properly.  I set the KB/TTY switch to KB, and the 
RUN/STEP switch to RUN.

I found a power supply that provides +5V at 5A, and tested it out on a dummy 
load to make sure it was healthy and had clean output, and it was fine.  I 
connected it up to the +5 and +5 Return (GND) terminals on the power supply 
input barrier strip, and held my breath, and switched on the power strip that 
the power supply was plugged into.

The result.  Absolutely nothing.
No sign of any activity on the display.
I didn't expect anything from the printer, because it didn't have its +24V 
power.

I left it powered for a little bit, checking for any chips that seemed 
unusually hot or anything else that seemed amiss, and nothing was obviously 
upset.   The CPU chip warmed up slightly to the touch, but wasn't at all 
alarming in terms of its temperature. I pressed the RESET switch a number 
of times, and it made no difference.   Oh well.

I powered it off, and pulled the ROM chips out, and decided I'd pop 'em in my 
ROM programmer and compare them to the ROM images I'd downloaded off the net.

The two monitor ROMs verified exactly.   The Assembler ROM also verified 
correctly.  One of the BASIC ROMs also verified properly, but the other failed 
the verification.  Hmm...upon READing it into the programmer's RAM, I dumped it 
out, and low and behold, it read back as all 0xFF's.   Oops..  I double checked 
that the ROM was properly seated in the programmer's ZIF socket, and it was.  I 
tried READing it a number of times, and the result was always the same.  This 
ROM must have expired somewhere along the way.  I can blast a 2732 with the 
proper bits and build an adapter to make BASIC work once I get the thing 
running, and hope that maybe sometime I might find a good blank OTP 2532 ROM I 
can blast with the code, or find one already programmed somewhere.

That said, the BASIC ROMs aren't required to get the AIM-65 to "boot up" in the 
Monitor, nor is the assembler ROM.  I decided to set the BASIC and Assembler 
ROMs aside, and just re-installed the known-good monitor ROMs in the proper 
sockets.

I double-checked that all of the RAM chips were properly inserted in their 
sockets by pulling and re-inserting them, as well as the 6502, 6532, and 
6522's.  The 6520 on the display board is soldered in, so no socket issues 
there.

I powered it up again, and verified that +5V was present on all of the chips on 
the board, and that was fine, with every chip showing +5 give or take +/- .02 
Volts.  All of the GND pins were at 0V, with only tiny (sub-millivolt) noise on 
GND.

I put a big dip-clip on the 6502, and got out my trusty Tektronix 2465 scope, 
and figured I check some of the basic stuff, like making sure that the clock 
generator was running, and that the 6502 properly would generate the Phase 1 
and Phase 2 clocks that the rest of the system uses, as well as looking at the 
address bus and data bus to see if it was doing anything.  The clock generator 
uses a 7474 dual flip flop, which I know have a tendency to go bad, so checking 
the clock was the logical first step.

I powered it up again after hooking everything up, and probing around showed 
that the cloc

VCF/PNW Exhibit & Trip Report - The Old Calculator Museum

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Hi, everyone,

Myself and my friend Mike, representing the Old Calculator Museum,
exhibited the line of Wang Laboratories electronic calculators at the
Vintage Computer Federation's Vintage Computer Festival/Pacific
Northwest edition, at the Living Computer Museum+Labs in Seattle,
Washington this past weekend.

This was the 2nd annual VCF/PNW, and it was clearly a success, as it was
significantly larger than the first event last year (which I went to,
but didn't exhibit at).   There were 30 exhibits, all of which were
really interesting, and a good-sized consignment area, as well as quite
a group of guest speakers who had interesting topics to present.  Of
course, being held in the Living Computer Museum+Labs was a bonus, as
the museum is an amazing place, with lots of vintage computers up and
running and accessible for people to actually use and experience.

The Old Calculator Museum exhibit consisted of a Wang LOCI-2 and punched
card readers (1st and 2nd-generation card readers), a Wang 360E w/320K
keyboard/display unit;362E with 370 Programmer and 371 Punched Card
Reader; 360SE 4-terminal timeshared calculator package with two 360KT
trig keyboards,  360K, and 320K keyboards, all running simultaneously
off the 360SE electronics unit; a Wang 720C; Wang 600-14TP; Wang
500-14TP; Wang 462 and 452 Programmable calculators; and a Wang C-52.
These are representatives of all of the lines of calculators that Wang
Laboratories made during its years in the electronic calculator market
(1965-1974).  All of the machines were running and available for
visitors to play with, with the exception of the LOCI-2 (which has a
thermal issue that manifests after about 3 minutes of operation) and the
500-14TP, which has some kind of problem that renders it catatonic that
I've not yet had a chance to try to diagnose/repair).   Also shown was
an original Wang Labs factory spare parts kit for the 300-series
calculators & peripherals, another Wang 360SE electronics package opened
up so people could see the insides, a number of circuit boards from Wang
300-series keyboard/display units, as well as core memory boards from
300-series electronics packages, core memory and circuit boards from
Wang 700-series calculators, and original sales documentation for Wang's
700, 500, and 600-series calculators.

The exhibit turned out pretty well, though I didn't have time to make up
signs to identify the stuff until we actually got there and made
hand-written signs, which turned out to be good enough -- it seems that
people could actually read my chicken-scratch handwriting.   The signs
included the retail price at the time the machine was introduced, and
people were stunned that in 1971, a Wang 720C outfitted as the exhibited
machine retailed for $7,000.   A lot of people asked how much that would
be in today's dollars, and I was able to use my phone to find
out...about $50,000.

The exhibit was almost constantly busy both days for the whole time the
museum was open, (10 AM - 5 PM), and the folks were all  very careful
with the old machines, and had really great questions about them.   I
was pretty surprised at how much interest there was in these old beasts.
The crowd was pretty mixed in age, from folks who actually used examples
of the machines in school, to youngsters who were totally shocked that
this is what calculators were like 50 years ago.The machines ran the
whole time the exhibit was open, and amazingly, despite the old
Germanium-based transistors in the Wang 300-series calculators, as well
as fussy magnetic rope ROMs and core memory in the 700 and 600-series
machines, they ran trouble-free.  A lot of folks had trouble getting the
machines to give answers they expected because of Wang's unusual math
entry method.   Once they were given a simple explanation of the way the
machines worked, they caught on quickly, and got answers they expected.
It was a lot of fun to explain and demonstrate the machines to the
visitors.   The Wang 370 Programmer hooked up to the 362E electronics
package was popular.  I had a little program punched up on a card that
would perform an iterative approximation of Pi.  It'd run for 100
iterations, then stop and display the approximation it had come to thus
far.   People were fascinated by the "spinning" Nixie Tubes as the
machine churned away on the iterations.   People also liked the 360KT
keyboards hooked up the 360SE simultaneous timeshared calculator
electronics package.  They enjoyed it when I demonstrated the two 360KT
keyboard/display units running the Sine of 45 degrees at the same time.
The timesharing between the two terminals was obvious as the calculator
switched back and forth between each of the keyboards as the
calculation, which takes about 25 seconds, was being performed.

Nixie tubes were a big attraction.  Many younger folks had never seen
them in person before, but almost everyone knew about them.   I think
that the popularization of Nixie tubes in the form of clocks using Nixie
tu

RE: atex system in Houston

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

In an earlier posting, I stated that the 4014 (with its 19" DVST tube)
was the largest DVST display that Tektronix made, to which
Paul K. responded:

> An article about those terminals also turns up the 4016 (25 inch tube
-- 4014 is 19 inches).  I'm not sure any more which of the two it 
> was.

I stand corrected.   

I never saw one of these during the 13 years (1977-1990) that I worked
at Tektronix.   But, after looking around online, indeed, they exist,
and there are a number of them still around, including a beautiful,
working example at the local Tektronix museum, VintageTek.org.  This is
probably the article that Paul referred to:

https://vintagetek.org/dvst-graphic-terminals/

Funny, last time I was at the museum (which was probably two+ years
ago), I didn't see it...perhaps it's a newer acquisition.  Had I seen
it, I would have been surprised, since it was always my impression that
the 19" tube was the largest.   

The 25" tube had to have some pretty crazy geometry correction circuitry
in the deflection system to correct for the curvature of the tube face
in X and Y dimensions, as well as probably some beam power correction to
account for the curvature.   A pretty amazing accomplishment, for sure.
Tektronix had some really amazing CRT engineering folks, as well as
fabulous CRT fab facilities back in the day.

Thank you, Paul,  for pointing out my error.  Definitely an example of
learning something new every day :-)

-Rick

RE: atex system in Houston

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Paul K. wrote:
> TMS-11 did support some specialized devices that could do more.  There
was the classified page layout system using a Tek 4010 style display
(4015?  A BIG tube).  

The big-tube Tektronix DVST (Direct View Storage Terminal) terminal was
the 4014.  The tube used in that terminal was the largest production
DVST tube that Tektronix made.
It was also used in the 4054 computer.

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

RE: 11/70 - original or 570 model more desirable?

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Bill D. wrote:

>Random question
>would you prefer having, if you had to pick only one, the original PDP
>11/70 or the newer "blue cabinets" PDP 11/70, assuming both were complete
>configurations with racks of storage etc as they would have been sold, more
>or less.
>Assume space and power are not issues, consider just the machine itself.

If either one showed up at my place, I would most certainly not kick it to the 
curb!

In fact, I'd figure out how to shoehorn it into the museum, spend the money to 
get the power needed, and upgrade the cooling.
I'd want to be able to run it periods of time, limited only by my electric bill 
:-)

Even running the 11/34A with three RL02's, an RK05 and RX02 for a day makes a 
definite jump on the little bar graph showing usage on our electric bill.
The PDP 8/e system, with three RK05's and RX01 running for a day makes a bump 
on the graph also.  
If I run both for a full day, my wife complains about the electric bill going 
up enough that it attracts her attention as an anomaly.

I can't imagine what impact it'd have on the electric bill to run a loaded up 
11/70 system for a full day.  
I suspect if I by some miracle ended up with a system like this (which I've 
dreamt of since I was in high school), I'd have to take a second job to pay the 
electric bill to keep it running.

-Rick

RE: Modcomp aquired

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

>Soon to be picked up and brought home. Lots of documentation with it as
>well. Christmas came early, eager to get it home and set up.

What a beauty!  In amazing condition.

Modcomp have a place in my heart, as an earlier Modcomp was the front-end 
communications processor for Tektronix' Control Data Cyber 73.   I was a 
systems manager (as it was called then) on the Cyber.  The Modcomp was rock 
solid reliable.  I don't ever recall having any kind of problem with the 
Modcomp.  It just ran and ran.   When the Cyber was to be shut down, all you 
had to do was halt the Modcomp, then when the Cyber was to be brought back up, 
two switch presses on the Modcomp (can't remember the first key, perhaps 
something like INIT), then START, and it was ready to go for when the Cyber 
came up.

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

RE: Desktop Metaphor

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Earlier, I wrote:
>> The whole desktop metaphor UI existed long before Windows 95 in non-Unix 
>> implementations by Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research >>Center) with the 
>> pioneering Xerox Alto, introduced in 1973,  which implemented  Alan Kay's 
>> concepts for the desktop metaphor that >>were postulated in 1970 using 
>> Smalltalk as the core operating system.

To which Liam P. responded:
>That, again, *was the point I was trying to make*.

>We used to have a ton of prior art and alternative designs, and today,
>they have all gone, with basically no impact.

I get the point, now.  

I was looking at it more from a historical standpoint than from the view of 
/today/.   I totally agree with Liam as far as every other desktop paradigm 
prior to Win95 is dead from a practical standpoint, except possibly the (and it 
can be debated) the Apple desktop environment. 

I believe that the history of the desktop metaphor prior to Win95 certainly had 
an impact on the development of the Win95 desktop environment, and those 
concepts carry through to today, but in terms of desktop UIs created after 
Win95, I can't argue that any aren't derivatives of the Win95 environment.

-Rick

RE: Desktop Metaphor

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Curious Marc wrote:

>Curiously, the Xerox Alto has quite advanced GUI and object oriented 
>programming (including the smalltalk windowing environment), >but no desktop 
>metaphor or icons that I have seen. I believe desktop metaphors appear later 
>in the Alto commercial successor, the >Xerox Star, and in the Apple Lisa, 
>which bears strong Xerox influences. Xerox’s desktop metaphor pushes the 
>object concept a bit far, >while the Lisa got what would become the modern 
>ubiquitous version of the concept almost dead on. Did I get this approximately 
>>right? Are there any other GUI desktop metaphors that predates this?

Marc is correct here.  My memory was faulty in my original posting about the 
"Desktop Metaphor".  The Alto, at least in its initial incarnation didn't 
really have a true desktop metaphor, though prototypes of the desktop 
environment may have run on it internally to PARC.   The Star, which was a 
commercial product (as opposed to Alto), definitely did, and that's where my 
memory was faulty.Thanks, Marc, for pointing out my error.

A place I worked for many, many years ago was involved with Smalltalk and OO 
database development.   They had a working Xerox Smalltalk machine, and  that's 
what I remembered the desktop metaphor from, but was thinking it was an Alto.  
After doing a little digging through old notes, I realized my memory of the 
machine was incorrect, and that the machine they had was a Star.

I remember tinkering around with the Star, which by the time I was at the 
company, had been pretty much put out to pasture.   The environment was quite 
intuitive, and easy to use, though it took me a little while to get my mind 
wrapped around the concept of Smalltalk, because I had no exposure to object 
environments prior to playing with the machine.   I was surprised at how 
responsive the machine was considering that the tech in it by that time was 
pretty old.   It was definitely an education playing with it.   I wonder 
whatever happened to that machine?  Hmmm...maybe I should send out some Emails 
to folks that I worked with back then.

The only other desktop metaphor environment that existed around this same time 
was at Tektronix, though the work at Tektronix was slightly behind the work  at 
Xerox,  was heavily based on the developments at Xerox, and the work was done 
under license from Xerox with regard to the Smalltalk-80 implementation used on 
the machine.

Tektronix created a machine called Magnolia that used a Smalltalk environment 
like the Alto/Star, had a bitmapped display and a desktop GUI.   Prototypes of 
the machine were running in early 1981, and it was quite refined by '82.  The 
machine never became a product, though it did pave the way for a couple of 
generations of Smalltalk-based workstations introduced by Tektronix beginning 
in late '84.   

-Rick

Desktop Metaphor

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Liam Proven wrote:


>On the one hand, the cosmetics. *Every* Unix desktop out there draws
>on Win95. 

I take exception to the "*Every*" in Liam's statement above. 
 Replacing "Unix" with "Linux" would make the statement more correct.

X-Windows-based desktop metaphor UI's existed within the Unix world long before 
Win95 came on the scene.
The whole desktop metaphor UI existed long before Windows 95 in non-Unix 
implementations by Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center) with the pioneering 
Xerox Alto, introduced in 1973,  which implemented  Alan Kay's concepts for the 
desktop metaphor that were postulated in 1970 using Smalltalk as the core 
operating system.

Windows 95, and the earlier versions of Microsoft's desktop metaphor UI's, were 
patterned after these implementations.   Microsoft simply took concepts that 
already existed in the world of UI design, and made their own implementation 
based on those concepts.

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

Fairly Extensive Singer/Friden "System Ten" Computer System for Rescue

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Through my Old Calculator Museum website, I have been contacted by a
gentleman that has a fairly substantial Singer/Friden
System 10 that is located in a building that the business wants to clear
out.

The computer system is slated to end up in a dumpster if it isn't
rescued.

The place the machine was stored is indoors, in an office-like space in
a larger warehouse style building.  The space was not temperature
controlled, but there are no signs of water damage or serious corrosion.
Some critters (probably mice) have been inside the cabinets of the
system, but the contact said that there were no obvious signs that they
chewed anything up.  The system is very dusty (it was not covered), and
it appears that some panels on the cabinets may have been removed, but
are probably with the system.
Some stuff appears to be partly disassembled.  There also might be some
spare parts, e.g., circuit boards.

The system consists of a CPU, probably a Model 20, two Model 80 Display
Terminals, a line printer of some sort, and two Mode 40 disk-pack (aka
dishwasher-sized) disk drives.   There are quite a few Model 41 disk
packs there..   There also appears to be some documentation.  There may
also be some kind of magtape drive with the system, as there is a rack
full of 7 or 9-track tapes hanging in it.  Not sure if these are
included with the system, though. 

Here is a link to some photos of the system:

http://pail.bensene.com/Singer10

Beware that the web host does not have much upstream bandwidth, and the
photos are pretty high resolution, so downloading them may take some
time.  Most of the photos are between 1.8 and 2.5 megabytes in size.

there is some documentation on the Singer System Ten up on Bitsavers at
http://bitsavers.org/pdf/singer/systemTen .  Some of the documentation
there is for the equipment that is available.

These systems aren't very common, and there likely aren't all that many
of them left in existence.  Singer sold a lot of these systems into
retail outlets as part of one of the first online Point-of-Sale systems.
One notable account was Sears and Roebuck, who installed a huge
networked (via Modem) environment using System Ten machines in stores to
run Point-of-Sale systems, with modem links to larger systems that
collected the information, and usually fed it to even larger systems
(e.g., IBM mainframe) for inventory management, bookkeeping, and other
large corporate-level reporting/management systems.  However, the
system aged quickly, as other competitors came onto the Point-of-Sale
scene very quickly, with systems that were less expensive, more
reliable, and more easily maintained.  Many of the Singer systems in
large retailers were replaced within a few years of being put into
service.  There was little market for "used" systems, so most all of
them taken out of service went for scrap.

The System 10 CPU was pretty unique in that it had "hardware"-based
timesharing.   The system managed time-slicing between "partitions" in
main memory (magnetic core) with hardware that provided a fixed
timeslice to each partition, switching to the next either when the
time-slice  ran out, or certain instructions (e.g., I/O) were executed
that would trigger an immediate context switch. The system had hardware
protection for the partitions to isolate the partitions from each other,
allowing them to run independently.  There was a shared and a read-only
system partition which could facilitate inter-partition communications
and management functions.
Pretty cool for a design done in the late '60's.   

It'd be a real shame for this system to end up in the trash, which is
exactly where it will go if a home can't be found for it relatively soon
(e.g., next couple of weeks).

The system is located in West Chicago, IL.   

It's all pretty sizable, so, you'd probably need a small
commercial-style moving van with a lift-gate (the stuff is likely quite
heavy, especially the disk drives) to haul it.  You would also probably
need a heavy-duty hand-truck or two, and some strong straps.   You'd
need some muscle, too.  I suspect it'd be more than a 1-man job.

My  contact wants it out of there.  You just have to come get it and
haul it away.   

If you have any serious interest in rescuing this system, drop me an
Email, and I'll put you in touch with my contact.

Hopefully someone out there can give this machine a new home.
Email:  rickb .at. bensene .dot. com


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

RE: Reading HP2000 tapes

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

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

..and Chuck responded:

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

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

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

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

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

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

RE: Got a kidney!

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Daniel S wrote:
> Got the call yesterday. Transplant operation was a success. Still at
the hospital recovering. Will update when able.

That is fantastic and blessed news!  Best to you for a quick and healthy
recovery.   You've got a lot of classiccmp folks keeping you in their
thoughts and prayers.

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

RE: CDC 6600 display character generation

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Paul wrote, concerning my "fireworks" show on the DD60 console of
Tektronix' Cyber 73 system:

>That's really weird.  Here's why.  The DD60 only has a single set of
X/Y drive chains.  It's all differential, so there are four of
everything, ?>ending up at the pair of X and pair of Y plates of the
CRTs.  The X/Y amplifiers connect to both tubes.  The reason you see two
separate >displays is that the tubes have separate unblank circuits.  So
the same character waveforms go to both, but at any given time only one
>of the two tubes has its beam turned on.  Also, focus and astigmatism
controls are separate for the two.  See the schematics.

>I can try to explain what happened in front of you by broken wires or
things like that, but it sure is hard to figure how that would cause
>fried tubes (other than the CRT, of course).

This happened probably somewhere between 35 and 40 years ago.  I'm going
from memory, and, as we know, memory over that long can be sketchy, so
it's possible that I some bits were dropped or flipped over the ages.
   
Believe me, the console did spit out a lot of sparks and little blobs of
molten metal, along with quite a bit of smoke.  I still have a small
scar on my left leg where one of the little blobs of metal burned me
after burning through the material of my slacks.

I remember keenly one of the CDC field guys saying that one of the big
driver tubes had shorted.  There were quite a slew of other parts
(including some smaller vacuum tubes) that ended up being replaced, as
well as the left CRT tube which had a phosphor burn right in the center.


What I observed, I remember quite clearly, although a lot happened in a
short time, and it's entirely possible that the right tube may have also
had something weird going on while I was watching what was going on with
the left tube.  I happened to be looking at the display up on the left
tube when the failure occurred, so my attention wasn't directly on the
right tube.   I remember glimpsing quickly at the right tube noting that
its display had disappeared as I was pushing the wheeled chair away from
the console with my feet.

Whatever the cause of the failure, it was something that surprised the
CDC guys.   Maybe the shorted tube was an artifact of the failure, and
not the cause...hard to remember exactly.  But, I do know that two of
those big ceramic and metal tubes were replaced, as well as the left
CRT, and a whole slew of other parts.   And I do clearly remember them
saying that the driver tubes had to be replaced in pairs.

Anyway, all told, it was an interesting adventure.   I loved those
days...I have a photo of myself sitting at the console of that machine
back in the day...probably some of the happiest times in my work career
were those days at Tektronix.

-Rick  

RE: CDC 6600 display character generation

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Speaking of CDC 6x00/Cyber 70-series consoles...

I had a bit of a  scary but memorable experience of sitting at the console of a 
Cyber 73, many years ago.

My job as a systems operator basically involved watching the console for 
magtape mount/dismount requests, printer service requests (e.g., out of paper), 
as well as in general monitoring the loading of the system, and assuring that 
all was running smoothly. 

The machine was running the KRONOS timesharing OS, with MODCOMP front-end 
communications processors providing serial terminal services.  There were two 
MODCOMP machines (not sure of the model, but would recognize them) that 
provided literally 100's of serial ports for terminal access through, in the 
earlier days, various port-selector equipment, and later, through a Sytek 
LAN-based terminal server networked together with thin coax strung around the 
buildings.

Anyway, I was sitting at the console one morning, and noted that very suddenly, 
the left tube's image coalesced into a single vertical line centered in the 
tube.  At the same time, I heard a quiet cracking noise coming out of the area 
of the console where the CRTs and final drive circuity was located.   The 
cracking noise very quickly increased in intensity, and then the vertical line 
of the left display (the right display stayed normal), suddenly collapsed into 
very bright dot in the center of the screen, then all at once, there was a loud 
BANG, the dot on the screen faded away quickly, the right screen went blank, 
and I was greeted by a shower of sparks and molten metal that spit out the slot 
underneath the tubes where the deadstart switch was located, and smoke coming 
out of the cooling slots in the cabinet.   Then, there was a clunk (someone 
throwing the power switch for the console), and everything settled down fairly 
quickly, other than there was a lot of stinky smoke in the air.

This whole sequence of events occurred in about 2 seconds.  I had just enough 
time to push my feet against the electronics bay underneath the console, and 
shove myself away from the shower of sparks.  I ended up with a small chunk of 
molten metal that landed on my left  leg and burnt through the fabric of my 
slacks and burned my skin pretty good.   There was a lot of acrid smoke that 
also came out of the console for a little while after the power was off.  We 
were concerned that there was a fire in there, but as it turned out, 
fortunately, there wasn't.  Other than the burn on my leg and a little hole 
in my slacks, I was unscathed.   But, I was a bit stunned by what happened, and 
it took me a few moments to realize what had happened.

The other people  in the data center reacted quickly.  One that was dismounting 
a tape on one of the drives that were situated behind the console by about 10 
feet, ran to the master power switch on the console and shut it off.   

Another ran to me, and was checking me out to make sure I was OK.  

One of the other folks started up a magic program on the Cyber  from a 
Tektronix 4023 terminal in the data center that effectively provided the same 
displays as the Cyber console, except only one of the displays could be viewed 
at a time.  The display was updated using the addressable cursor of the 4023 
terminal, though it wasn't nearly as "real-time" as the actual console displays.
Commands could also be given in the same form as they could be keyed on the 
console keyboard.This served as the alternate console while the main 
console was dead.   

The smoke detection system in the data center triggered the fire suppression 
system (Halon in those days), and the klaxons went off indicating we had  30 
(maybe it was 45, can't remember for sure) seconds to get out of the room 
before the Halon dumped and all the oxygen was flushed from the space.   There 
was an abort switch on the back wall of the data center, and one of the other 
folks ran and hit the abort to keep the Halon from dumping (which was rather 
expensive to recharge).  The fire department showed up almost immediately, 
because they were A) located at one corner of our business campus, and B) their 
station was tied into the fire systems in the data center, and were notified 
when the smoke sensors triggered.  They came and checked everything out to make 
sure no lingering hot spots could spark fire.  

After the ruckus settled down, I resumed monitoring the system with the 4023 
terminal, and operations proceeded normally.  The outage of the console had no 
effect on the operation of the Cyber -- everything ran along just fine during 
the chaos.  End users generally didn't even know it happened.

We had onsite CDC service engineers, and they responded immediately.   It 
turned out that one of the big driver  tubes had failed in such a way it 
shorted, and that caused a cascade failure that eventually took out the other 
tube, and caused some pretty severe stress in other components in the high 
voltage power supply that ended up

RE: Original CAD code in the wild?

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Many moons ago, at Tektronix, I did a stint working in the Scientific Computer 
Center's Computer-Aided Design Development group.
There was a software package, written in FORTRAN (77, I believe) on Tek's 
Control Data Cyber 73 system running KRONOS, called PIRATE.
It was an automated circuit board placer/router.  It would take in netlist 
information, along with information about board geometry and locations of fixed 
components, along with a library of component information (e.g., IC pinouts and 
packaging geometry), and generate Gerber photoplotter output, and NC drill 
tapes.

The timeframe I was in the group was around 1977 to 1981 or so. 

I don't have any of that old code, sadly.   But, I figured I'd mention it here, 
as perhaps maybe somewhere, someone has it.
I remember that the first name of the guy that wrote it was Roger, but for the 
life of me, I can't remember his last name.
I recall that Roger was brilliant, and was constantly tweaking the placement 
and maze-router algorithms to improve the placement and routing performance.
 It could do complex multi-layer boards, with internal vias, ground planes and 
power planes, etc.   

It would be cool if it could be found and archived.

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

RE: Identifying an aluminum panel

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Not knowing what the size actually is, it looks familiar.  Given the bootprints 
on it, it looks like it's a pretty good-sized chunk of aluminum.  It  reminds 
me of the back panel of some of the Sun 3/2xx and 4/2xx server chassis.  Large, 
heavy switching power supply and backplane inside.  Even when devoid of circuit 
cards, the chassis was pretty heavy, and by the time you added CPU, memory and 
I/O interface cards, it'd get even heavier.   I figure that the weight on the 
warning tag is "empty" weight, which seems about right based on my memory.I 
could be completely wrong, though, as I am not at a place where I can look at 
the old Sun 4/280 system I have to compare the covers with the photo - and 
there were lots of machines in the '90's that were physically large and heavy 
that used similar chassis materials.

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

-Original Message-
From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Kyle Owen via 
cctalk
Sent: Friday, March 30, 2018 6:32 PM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Identifying an aluminum panel

I feel like I should know what this panel goes to...I found it in my garage 
when cleaning up. Any ideas?

http://i.imgur.com/u4LMNqE.jpg

Thanks,

Kyle

RE: Re: Spectre & Meltdown

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Ed Sharpe wrote:
>what about  xenon processors??

Xenon?  You mean the processor jointly developed by Microsoft & IBM based on 
the PowerPC architecture, developed and used in the Xbox 360?

Or perhaps did you mean Xeon (note no N in the middle)?  There is a big 
difference.

Don't know if the Xenon is susceptible, but given that the problem is with the 
way VM works, it could be susceptible, but the code to exploit it would be 
completely different because of the PowerPC architecture.

Intel Xeon processors are marketed toward non-consumer computers such as 
servers and workstations.  All Xeon processors are susceptible because they all 
do speculative execution.

The solution to avoiding infection is not to use any web browser that has Java 
enabledat least for now.
Of course, get rid of Flash if you have it.  It could also be a vector, though 
that hasn't been proven.
Use no-script.
Better  yet, use a text-only browser that ignores all scripting of any kind.
Don't install /any/ software for any source for which you are not completely 
assured of safety  (good luck).
Get rid of any software on your machine that you are not 100% sure about, 
especially if it can automatically update itself.
If you have any third-party software that is set to auto-update, either turn 
the feature off, or only allow you to determine when updates are applied.
Of course, update your OS as soon as updates are available, as patches (which 
will likely slow your system down) are forthcoming from Microsoft and various 
Linux trees.
The best defense, however, is simply call your ISP and tell them you want your 
connection turned off. ;-)
It's getting really dangerous out there.

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

RE: Can anyone identify what this board is/does?

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

This is a wire rope ROM, but it is unpopulated, meaning that there are no wires 
strung through the cores to encode anything.
The little pegs located below the cores are for routing the wire.
The diodes are all for address selection, and the circuitry above the cores is 
the sense amplifiers to take the small current induced in the "secondary" 
winding around the core and amplify it to a level usable by the rest of the 
logic.  It is a 20-bit wide word.  I didn't take the time to try to figure out 
how many words that there are, but I'd suspect something on the order of 256 to 
512 words could be stored.
To program it, thin magnet wire would be soldered to pads at the outputs of the 
address decoding (one pad for each "word"), and then threaded through (or not) 
each of the 20 cores to encode 1's and 0's, and then mass terminated on another 
pad.
The threading operation would be tedious.  Generally there would be a special 
needle-like tool that would be used to thread the wire for each word.
Definitely an interesting piece.

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


-Original Message-
From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Tony Aiuto via 
cctalk
Sent: Friday, December 01, 2017 7:12 AM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Can anyone identify what this board is/does?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/263005049078

EBay listing for a "Soviet Magnetic Ferrite Core Memory Board". It looks like 
20 something gigantic cores and a lot of diodes. I am guessing it is some kind 
of ROM, but it doesn't look like a rope memory. And maybe the cores are not 
cores at all, but some sort of inductor. I've not seen this before.

"Personal" Computers (Was: Details about IBM's early 'scientific' computers)

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

I wrote:

>> While the definition of the term "personal computer" varies depending

>> on who is using the term, these machines, and others like them, were 
>> designed to be used at a much more personal level than the
large-scale 
>> mainframe machines housed in the glass-walled rooms where only
"special" people were allowed
>> anywhere near them.
^^
  ^^

To which, Rich A. replied:

>This, like "Multics never got out of the lab", is a bogo-meme.
(Thanks, Neil!)
> People did not *need* to get near the mainframes in order to do their
jobs, unlike the jobs for which the small systems 
> (and you forgot the PDP-11 in your list) were created.  Most
programming on mainframes was special purpose, batch oriented, data
>processing connected to accounting systems (GL/AP/AR/PR), and a lot of
the rest was high intensity engineering (where at this level >even
physics is engineering) which needed lots of data handling for short
runs. 

Yeah...I can agree with that.  But, part of the talk was about getting
"up close" with the computer, at a personal level - hands-on.
The glass-walled room machines weren't that way, and thus weren't
considered "personal computers", for just the reason you mentioned --
the work typically done on them was of a different class of work that
didn't require any kind of hands-on activity with the machine (except
for the operators, who loaded up the jobs, managed the tapes, and
gathered the printouts).   

The discussion had gone from talk about the IBM 709/709X computers,
which were more "glass room" type machines, to discussion about personal
computers.  I suffered some angst over the discussion of machines like
Apple IIs or even Altair 8800's as the first personal computers, when in
fact, the general term applied to computers that came long before these
machines.

Perhaps the glass-room meme isn't so much bogus, as it is a sign of the
cultural times.   In those days, the big machines were very expensive,
and required a lot of support --  that meant special power, air
conditioning, raised floors, and highly-trained people.   The
"management" of these big machine installations had a lot at stake...and
as such, they were very protective of their machines, which is most of
the reason they were encased in glass (they needed to be glass to be
able to show them off without letting people in...in the days, big
computer installations were class icons).   

It wasn't really so much that the work that the consumers (I wouldn't
use the word "users" to describe them, because they were never really
"using" the machine) of the results of the machines didn't need to have
access to the machines...it was more because the management only wanted
those who had all the necessary training and knowledge operating the
machines to assure the maximum amount of productivity for their
multi-million dollar investments to gain the best return on that
investment, as well as safety for these "delicate" machines.

As for the PDP-11, it was indeed a significant omission.  Honestly, I
ran out of time.  I missed the PB 250, which certainly should have been
on the list, and the PDP-11...and I'm sure that there are quite a number
of other machines that were missed.  

Compiling a full list of this class of machines, even during this
somewhat limited time period, would be a daunting process.There were
many companies that popped up in the 1960s, along with those from
established computer makers,  that marketed small computers that were
generally intended to be used on a single-user basis, by individuals.
Examples off the top of my head are Computer Automation (PDC-808), Smith
Corona/Marchant SCM 7816, 3M (yes, the adhesive people) 2018, Control
Data 160/160-A, Digital Equipment PDP-1, HP 2100-series, Data
Acquisition Corp. DAC-512.it could go on and on.  

I was writing my message as I was getting ready to head off to work, and
had to stop before I ended up being late.

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

RE: Details about IBM's early 'scientific' computers

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

On 11/15/2017 11:59 AM, Rick Bensene via cctalk wrote:

> While the definition of the term "personal computer"  varies depending 
> on who is using the term, these machines, and others like them, were 
> designed to be used at a much more personal level than the large-scale 
> mainframe machines housed in the glass-walled rooms where only "special"
> people were allowed anywhere near them.   

Chuck responded:

>How about "small systems", able to be powered solely from a 115V/20A source 
>(or its 220V equivalent)?

>The PB 250 would certainly fall in this category also.

Indeed, a notable omission from my list.   

The PB 250 definitely is in that class of machine, and the unique part about it 
is that its main memory and register storage was made of recirculating delay 
lines.  This made the machine somewhat slow, but in most cases, a bit faster 
than most of the tube-based machines with magnetic drum memories.  The delay 
lines could be a little temperamental, but were less expensive than magnetic 
drums, making the machine a pretty good value for the time.  It was 
fully-transistorized, and had a Friden Flexowriter for I/O.  The machine had 
interfacing capabilities that allowed a number of various I/O devices to be 
connected to it.

The PB 250  benefitted from the design genius of Stanley Frankel, the Manhattan 
Project nuclear physicist that went into computing after his A-bomb development 
work had finished.  Frankel assisted with many of the design aspects of the PB 
250, as well as doing the complete logic design of the LGP-30, which was based 
on a small machine he built on his own known as MINAC.  He also did the design 
of the SCM/Marchant Cogito 240 & 240SR electronic calculators, as well as the 
brilliantly-designed, microcoded Diehl Combitron electronic calculator.

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

RE: Details about IBM's early 'scientific' computers

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Grumpy Ol' Fred wrote:
>Yes, 1968-1973 had time-sharing for personal computing, but not
"personal computers"

We tend to forget about earlier "personal" computers...machines that
were generally designed for one individual to be able to sit down and
use interactively.  That isn't to say that said individual "owned" the
computer, nor did many of these end up originally purchased by
individuals for personal use.  However,  many of them did end up in
people's homes as "personal computers" after they aged enough that they
were no longer commercially viable and were inexpensive enough for an
enthusiast to purchase or even get for free..mainly the machines from
the 1950's and early 1960's that, by the late 1960's and early 1970's
were completely obsolete.

There were a number of small, generally single-user computer systems
built even in the 1950's.
Examples:   

- Royal McBee/Librascope/General Precision LGP-30 (1956) -- Tube-based
machine with magnetic drum memory and Friden Flexowriter
- Bendix G-15 (1956) - Tube based, drum memory, IBM I/O typewriter,
punched tape reader.  Numerous periperhals
- Monroe Monrobot III/V (~1958-1961) --  Desk-sized CPU,  drum memory,
decimal math, and punched tape programming
- IBM 650 Autopoint (1957) -- Tube logic, magnetic drum storage, paper
tape programming, decimal math
- Autonetics Recomp II (1958) -- Mini-refrigerator-sized, desk-side CPU,
IBM typewriter, paper tape, IBM I/O Typewriter 
- Clary DE-60 (1960) --  Transistor-based, drum memory, decimal math,
diode-ROM-based add-on math(Trig, etc.), small numeric printer
- IBM 1130 (1965) -- Transistor-based(SLT), core memory, cartridge
hard-disk, IBM I/O Typewriter, numerous peripherals
- DEC PDP-8 (1965) -- Transistor based 12-bit CPU, core memory, teletype
I/O, numerous peripherals
- Data General Nova (1969) -- IC-based 16-bit CPU, core memory, teletype
I/O, numerous peripherals
- Wang 2200 (1973) -- IC-based(TTL) deskside CPU, BASIC built-in,
cassette tape, solid state memory, CRT display
- HP 9830 (1972) -- IC-based desktop, BASIC built-in, cassette tape,
solid state memory, LED alphanumeric display, many peripherals

These are just a few examples of computers (or in some of the earlier
cases, highly programmable calculators) built before and during the
'68-73 timeframe  that were designed with the intent of an individual
interacting directly with the machine.  Most ran off of standard
residential/office power, required no special air-conditioning, and were
simple enough that only a moderate amount of training was required to
allow someone to make use of the machines.   

While the definition of the term "personal computer"  varies depending
on who is using the term, these machines, and others like them, were
designed to be used at a much more personal level than the large-scale
mainframe machines housed in the glass-walled rooms where only "special"
people were allowed anywhere near them.   

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

RE: Tektronix 8560 external hard disk connector [WAS: Re: The origin of SCSI]

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Al K. wrote:

>there are two versions. the 1981 8560 uses microp 1200, later ones have xebec 
>1410 and are sasi

>070-3899-00_8560_MSDU_Installation_Guide_Nov81.pdf
>070-4759-00_8560_8561_8562_Service_Mar84.pdf

If the 8560 in question uses the 8" hard disk drive from Micropolis, then 
Bitsavers also has the documentation for the drive, which is the same document 
I used years ago to build the hardware interface and write the code to talk to 
the drive:

http://bitsavers.org/pdf/micropolis/100292_Specification_1220_Series_Rigid_Disk_Drive_Subsystems_Oct79.pdf

There is a jumper block on the 1220's controller board that configures the 
sector size.   This wasn't documented in the above documentation.  I needed 512 
byte sectors, and the drive didn't seem to be responding that way (it turned 
out it was configured for 1K-byte sector size), and I had to use the schematics 
for the drive to figure out how to wire up a jumper block that would 
reconfigure it for 512 byte sectors.  And yes, I could have written the driver 
to deal with this, but I didn't have a lot of memory available for the sector 
buffer, so I decided to try to figure out how to reset the sector size to 512 
bytes.  The problem is, I can't find the schematic anywhere for the Micropolis 
1220 controller board.  That schematic holds the key to wiring the jumper block 
for the sector size.The original jumper block was encapsulated in epoxy.

I don't remember what sector size TNIX (the Unix kernel that ran on the 8560's 
CPU (which was a PDP 11/23)), but if the drive is working well enough, you 
should be able to figure out the sector size being used.   If you found another 
drive that had the controller, you could just remove the controller board, and 
daisy chain the drive in, and it'd end up using whatever sector size the 
controller board on the internal drive is configured for.

For some time I had an 8560 that I tinkered with for a while.   It was one with 
the Micropolis 8" drive.  I bought it at the Tek Country store for pretty 
cheap...power supply was kind of sick, so I fixed it, and got it running.   
Fortunately, no one changed the root password from the default, so I could 
login to it.  I found TNIX to be painfully slow, as I was used to using BSD on 
a VAX.  Someone at Tek had done a build of RT-11 that ran on the box, and I 
played around with that for a while...it was a lot faster than TNIX, but not 
really multi-user like TNIX.   After a while I got bored with it and ended up 
giving the system to someone that I found that was really interested in it.  

When some of those  Micropolis 8" drives showed up for pretty cheap at the 
Country Store,  that's what led me to buy a few of them and hook 'em up to my 
Board Bucket system, which hosted a local computer bulletin board system (Bit 
Bucket Bulletin Board, Portland, OR).   The drives were power hungry, made a 
lot of heat, and were also rather noisy.   I eventually replaced them with a 
home-built SASI interface, a Xebec 1410 SASI to ST-506 converter board, and a 
couple of 40MB 5 1/4" full-height Micropolis disk drives.  They were a lot 
quieter, used a lot less power, and were faster.  I think that the old 
Micropolis 1220/1200 drives were tossed out in a move somewhere along the line, 
which I regret.   

It would not be terribly difficult to build a piece of hardware that emulated 
the Micropolis drive, using some little computer (Arduino, etc.) or even a PC 
through a parallel port perhaps.Using  a SSD or even a USB thumb drive for 
storage in it would provide lots of disk space for multiple disk images which 
could be connected up to the 8560 host to appear as individual drives, and, if 
the code was written reasonably well, the data transfer rate could be decent 
(the drive isn't terribly fast).   

If the 8560 you have is one with the Xebec SASI to ST-506 board in it and a 5 
1/4" hard disk drive, then I think that the expansion port is actually SASI.   
That said, though, you likely won't find many if any SCSI  drives that will 
work with that interface.   I think, though, that the Xebec S1410 could control 
two ST-506 drives.  Cables might be able to be cobbled up to add a second drive 
to the system (probably wouldn't fit in the chassis) off of the 1410.   
However, finding good working ST-506 drives today is quite a challenge.   
And..you'd have to find a drive that was compatible with the system in terms of 
geometry.

It would be really good, though, if somehow the original disk in your system 
could be imaged at the byte level.   I doubt that there are very many of the 
8560's around that still run.

-Rick



   

   

RE: Tektronix 8560 external hard disk connector [WAS: Re: The origin of SCSI]

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Chris G. wrote:
>This reminds me of something I wanted to ask for some time:

>I've got a Tektronix 8560 where the internal hard disk is not that much 
>reliable anymore. No read/write errors, but after running for >some time (btw. 
>24h and 48h) it seems to reset. 
>Spin-down, spin-up, etc. until the host receives an error.

>The connector for an external hard disk looks like an external SCSI connector. 
>I haven't found the pinout or other description in the >docs. My hope was that 
>it might be really SASI or SCSI, but given the release date of the machine (I 
>don't know exactly but I think >around 1978 or 1979), it might not be.

>Does anyone know more details about this connector/connection?


If I recall correctly, these machines used an 8" Micropolis hard disk drive.   
These were most definitely not SCSI, or even SASI.  They used a proprietary 
Micropolis parallel interface.
The disk expansion connector, while looking like it might be a SASI/SCSI 
connector, isn't...it brings out that Micropolis interface.

Many, many moons ago, when I worked at Tektronix, I purchased a number of these 
drives (I think that they had a capacity of 35MB , IIRC) at the Tektronix 
Country Store (they were cheap), and built an interface for a Tektronix Board 
Bucket (6809 CPU) so I could use the drives on the system.  It wasn't a 
difficult interface (it was TTL, if I remember right) to write code to talk to, 
and I was able  write a driver for it for the FLEX operating system.

I wouldn't try plugging anything into that external connector, unless it's an 
original Tektronix disk expansion unit for the 8560.

Of course, as mentioned, this is all IIRC (If I Recall Correctly).

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

RE: Olivetti Programma 101 on EBay

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

This eBay listing makes me really happy that I bought a beautifully kept, 
spotlessly clean Programma 101 with original dust cover, power cord, and 
original sales receipt from Portland Typewriter & Office Machine Co. (Portland, 
Oregon) for $300 in early 2013 from the original owner.The original owner 
claimed that this machine was the first Programma 101 sold in the Pacific 
Northwest.

The calculator was lovingly cared for during its tenure as a critical component 
of the owner's engineering business until it was replaced by an IBM PC.  This 
particular calculator was used extensively in the engineering calculations for 
the design of the Glenn Jackson bridge over the Columbia River between 
Portland, OR, and Vancouver WA.   After it was retired in 1984, it was kept in 
the owner's home office, as a cherished possession.  The machine literally 
looks like it could have been trapped in a time vortex for all these years, it 
is so clean inside and out.   There is only one tiny chip in the paint, and no 
scratches anywhere to be found.   It appears essentially unused, with virtually 
no signs of wear and tear.

The machine is in significantly better condition than the one listed, and has 
all belts intact and in usable condition.   It  is non-operational due to a 
broken nylon gear in the print drum drivetrain, but I am working on getting a 
replacement gear manufactured, and once it is in place, I am quite sure that it 
will be fully  operational.All of the rubber parts (printer platen and 
rollers, mag-card drive rollers) are in pristine condition.

It is interesting that the seller of the machine listed on eBay claims that an 
operational Programma 101 /sold/ for $36K, when in fact, the listing was 
"ENDED", because the "item was no longer available".  This does not imply in 
any way that the machine sold for $36K.  Also, the claim that only five 
operational Programma 101s are in existence is bunk -- I know of twelve that 
are in operational condition, and surely there are others out there that I am 
not aware of.  

The Programma 101 is indeed a benchmark machine in electronic calculator 
history.   While not the first programmable electronic calculator as many 
claim, it definitely set the standard for a long time (especially during this 
particularly frenetic period of electronics development), until the HP 9100A 
came out in '68.  I don't want to diminish its place in history in any way. 
 But...

...Maybe I should put it up on eBay, as-is, for let's say, oh, $30K?

Sheesh.

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

RE: 2.11BSD on two RL02 drives? Probably not, but...

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Glen S. wrote:

>QBus ESDI controllers are relatively cheap. I have several Emulex QD21, Dilog 
>DQ696, and Sigma SDC-RQD11 QBus ESDI controllers. The >problem I have with 
>them is that I now have more controllers than working ESDI drives. Some of the 
>drives that I had which were >working have died while sitting idle. Guaranteed 
>working ESDI drives don't seem to be cheap anywhere and shipping them isn't 
>cheap >either.

I've found much the same with ESDI drives...they tend to die just sitting, and 
it's not stiction that seems to be the culprit...they simply quit working.   
Not sure why, but at one time I had a stash of 18 ESDI drives of various makes 
and sizes, and I'm now down to 2 that still work.  The rest all just quit.  
When not in use, the drives are stored in anti-static bags with a dessicant bag 
inside, and then stored in a storage tote lined with anti-static pink poly 
sheeting.  The totes are stored in an environmentally controlled room.   I 
don't see any reason why they'd die due to environmental conditions.  Something 
else has to be going on with them.

>To me it seems a lot more cost effective and less trouble in the long run to 
>pay a little more for something like a CMD CQD-200/220 or >Emulex UC07 SCSI 
>controller. I've somehow managed to acquire a couple dozen or so QBus SCSI 
>controllers of various flavors over the >years.

That said, my PDP 11 is Unibus, and Unibus SCSI controllers are darned 
expen$ive.

I do have some working Fujitsu SMD drives (now, these drives just keep on 
running!), and I'd love to find a Unibus SMD controller (preferably Emulex), so 
that I could run a couple of these drives on the 11.   Anyone out there got one 
that emulates popular PDP-11 disk drives supported by most of the OS's (RT-11, 
RSTS, and BSD Unix) that can make a given SMD drive "appear" compatible that 
the would be willing to part with for a reasonable price?  I've heard that the 
Emulex UD33 and SC21 are the SMD controllers of choice, but do they do MSCP?   
I'd love to head any comments from those "in the know" out there.  Are there 
other alternatives other than Emulex that may work well also?

Thanks for reading!

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

Re: Diehl Combitron

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

This is a truly wonderful accomplishment, as well as a great remembrance of a 
true genius in early electronic calculator design, not to mention computer 
design.  

Stan Frankel isn't all that well known, but those that do know of him hold him 
in high regard. He was a master of minimizing circuitry yet still providing 
great functionality. He deserves more of a place in history than he has 
received, but fortunately, more and more recognition of his accomplishments are 
being acknowledged by historians as time goes on.

I will pass this posting on to his son, Allan, with whom I communicate with 
frequently. I am sure he will love this remembrance of his father.

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


From: Christian Corti via cctalk 
Sent: Jul 19, 2017 4:20 AM
To: cctalk@classiccmp.org
Subject: Diehl Combitron

Hi,
I want to share the latest result of a bachelor thesis in our museum. We 
are now able to program and load arbitrary machine programs and run them 
on the Combitron. As a proof-of-concept, the student wrote an hommage to 
Stanley Frankel, the designer of the CPU, by writing a boot tape that in 
the end, fills the M delay line with data that is displayed on a scope, 
triggering to the beginning of a 110 bit word.

http://computermuseum.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de/pics/combitron/sf1.jpg
http://computermuseum.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de/pics/combitron/sf2.jpg

Christian

RE: RC11 manuals / schematics online?

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Steve wrote:

>I acquired an RC11 flip chip set with the FOX 2 (PDP-11/15). Although I don't 
>have a schematic for them, I do have the schematic print >set for the 
>controller for the fixed-head / drum that Foxboro supplied which was a DDC 
>6200.

Check this out: 
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Data-General-Nova-DEC-PDP-11-2-5MG-Fixed-Head-Disk-Memory-System-UL6200-128-/122474087968?hash=item1c84064620:g:V~IAAOSwhvFZB59T

I'm not connected in any way with the seller.  Just thought it was interesting 
that the DDC 6200 was mentioned in this article, and I'd stumbled across this 
earlier today on eBay.

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

RE: Genuine KM11 board (and plea for RX01 Front Bezel)

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Tony D. wrote:

> Are any DEC enthusiasts here jealous of this :
>https://www.flickr.com/photos/tony_duell/33427116663/in/dateposted-public/

Interesting coincidence.   I was digging through some boxes of stuff yesterday, 
and I came across two sets of these in really nice condition.   Haven't tested 
'em yet (had /no/ idea that they could be used for diagnosis of an RX01 control 
board) but looks like they should be pretty simple to check out.  I had didn't 
know of the existence of these before yesterday.   I did a little searching and 
found that they are useful for debugging 11/35 and 11/40 systems, as well as 
RK05 drives...but didn't see anything about the RX01 drive electronics.   

Speaking of RX01's, does anyone out there have a spare front bezel for the RX01 
that they'd be willing to part with?  
I have a working RX01 on my 8/e system (both drives good, amazingly) but the 
bezel was missing when I got it. 
It'd be nice to have, as it looks rather dumpy in the rack with the rest of the 
system.

Best wishes to all,
-Rick
--
Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
http://oldcalculatormuseum.com
Beavercreek, Oregon  USA

RE: Kennedy 9000 Tape Drives, Terminals and Packs

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Sorry all, this was meant to be a personal Email.   Still haven't gotten used 
to the new way that the list works.
My apologies.

-Rick


-Original Message-
From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Rick Bensene 
via cctalk
Sent: Monday, April 17, 2017 1:11 PM
To: Earl Baugh; General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: RE: Kennedy 9000 Tape Drives, Terminals and Packs

> I was helping out someone here locally to dig thru a pile of electronics that 
> he had obtained in helping out a woman clean out her house.

> Her husband passed away and she wanted the space back.  Apparently the 
> husband "somehow" dealt in HW repair.
> A good number of the items were known broken spares, Shugart 1004 drives 
> (about 36) and a couple tandem floppies.
> Those he found a new home for.

With that many 1004 drives, surely quite a few can be made to work again.  They 
are weird drives, though...very strange interface, and very few interface cards 
to hook 'em up to computers.

> There were a few items that I told him I'd help circulate info on 
> since they are a bit more specialized  (I'm just trying to help him 
> liquidate the items, he is surprising the woman who he got it from 
> with a cash gift when this > is done)

> 1) 2 NOS Kennedy 9000 series tape drives.   I checked, they look pristine.
> There was an invoice that says they're Kennedy 9000-3, 4s models.

Wow!  One of those would be very cool to get.   I can't find any information on 
the "4S" model, though.  I am wondering if it has a SCSI interface.  If it 
does, even better.  
It's kind of a limited drive, only doing 800 or 1600BPI (no 6250), and only 
runs at 45 inches per second, so it's not very fast.  But, still, if it is 
SCSI, it could definitely be interesting.
Do you know if there are any docs there with them?  Any way to tell what 
interface they use?   I would actually be interested in laying hands one of 
them.
In reading stuff online, it does appear that these drives were frequently 
configured with SCSI interfaces.
Is there any way that this can be checked.  The "4S" model number seems 
encouraging.


2) 9 drive packs. marked ATHANA, which may be RK05 packs (I couldn't find any 
markings on them to indicate what size, etc.) ATHANA was a magnetic media 
manufacturer.  They made floppy disks and cartridge hard disk drives that were 
compatible with many vendors' hard disk system.
If they look like RK05 packs, they are probably compatible with DEC RK05 or 
RK07 drives for PDP 8 or PDP 11 systems.  The difference between the packs is 
the number of index slits in the index hub on the bottom of the pack.   12 
index slits (not counting the one "home" reference slit which is at an "odd" 
location) indicates that it's for a 16-bit system, like PDP 11.  If 16 index 
slits, then it's for a 12-bit system, like PDP 8.
If they are 16-slit packs, and look very RK05-ish, I might be interested in 'em 
because I don't have many disk packs for my PDP 8/e system. 

3) Lastly he has two Visual 50 terminals.

I think I've got enough terminals.   Now, if they were Ann Arbor Ambassador 
terminals, I would be interested .

Can some photos be taken of the disk cartridges, and perhaps the back of the 
Kennedy drives to see what the interface connector(s) look like?
Is this person  wanting money for the stuff, or just to get rid of it?

Shipping the Kennedy drive would be expensive, and I'd worry about damage, so 
it'd probably have to be custom crated.   That could get pretty expensive.   
But, to me it is worth checking into if the drive looks like it has a SCSI 
interface.

Thanks, Earl, good stuff!

Hope all is going well for you.

Blessings,
-Rick

RE: Kennedy 9000 Tape Drives, Terminals and Packs

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

> I was helping out someone here locally to dig thru a pile of electronics that 
> he had obtained in helping out a woman clean out her house.

> Her husband passed away and she wanted the space back.  Apparently the 
> husband "somehow" dealt in HW repair.
> A good number of the items were known broken spares, Shugart 1004 drives 
> (about 36) and a couple tandem floppies.
> Those he found a new home for.

With that many 1004 drives, surely quite a few can be made to work again.  They 
are weird drives, though...very strange interface, and very few interface cards 
to hook 'em up to computers.

> There were a few items that I told him I'd help circulate info on since they 
> are a bit more specialized  (I'm just trying to help him liquidate the items, 
> he is surprising the woman who he got it from with a cash gift when this > is 
> done)

> 1) 2 NOS Kennedy 9000 series tape drives.   I checked, they look pristine.
> There was an invoice that says they're Kennedy 9000-3, 4s models.

Wow!  One of those would be very cool to get.   I can't find any information on 
the "4S" model, though.  I am wondering if it has a SCSI interface.  If it 
does, even better.  
It's kind of a limited drive, only doing 800 or 1600BPI (no 6250), and only 
runs at 45 inches per second, so it's not very fast.  But, still, if it is 
SCSI, it could definitely be interesting.
Do you know if there are any docs there with them?  Any way to tell what 
interface they use?   I would actually be interested in laying hands one of 
them.
In reading stuff online, it does appear that these drives were frequently 
configured with SCSI interfaces.
Is there any way that this can be checked.  The "4S" model number seems 
encouraging.


2) 9 drive packs. marked ATHANA, which may be RK05 packs (I couldn't find any 
markings on them to indicate what size, etc.)
ATHANA was a magnetic media manufacturer.  They made floppy disks and cartridge 
hard disk drives that were compatible with many vendors' hard disk system.
If they look like RK05 packs, they are probably compatible with DEC RK05 or 
RK07 drives for PDP 8 or PDP 11 systems.  The difference between the packs is 
the number of index slits in the index hub on the bottom of the pack.   12 
index slits (not counting the one "home" reference slit which is at an "odd" 
location) indicates that it's for a 16-bit system, like PDP 11.  If 16 index 
slits, then it's for a 12-bit system, like PDP 8.
If they are 16-slit packs, and look very RK05-ish, I might be interested in 'em 
because I don't have many disk packs for my PDP 8/e system. 

3) Lastly he has two Visual 50 terminals.

I think I've got enough terminals.   Now, if they were Ann Arbor Ambassador 
terminals, I would be interested .

Can some photos be taken of the disk cartridges, and perhaps the back of the 
Kennedy drives to see what the interface connector(s) look like?
Is this person  wanting money for the stuff, or just to get rid of it?

Shipping the Kennedy drive would be expensive, and I'd worry about damage, so 
it'd probably have to be custom crated.   That could get pretty expensive.   
But, to me it is worth checking into if the drive looks like it has a SCSI 
interface.

Thanks, Earl, good stuff!

Hope all is going well for you.

Blessings,
-Rick

Trip to CHM - Hotel/Restaurant Advice

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Hello, all,

In mid-June, I am planning a trip to Mountain View for two days to visit the 
Computer History Museum.

I plan on flying out of Portland early AM on June 14, checking into hotel, then 
heading straight to the museum for the day.
I will go back to the hotel for the evening, and return to the museum on the 
15th, and stay into early afternoon, and then check out of the hotel and head 
to the airport to return home.

I haven't been to CHM before, and am looking forward to spending an extended 
period of time there.

What I'm asking for is help/recommendations in terms of a good hotel to stay at 
that is relatively close to the museum.  I don't want to be in a luxury hotel, 
nor do I want to be in a dive.
I'd also like to be in a place that has a restaurant relatively close by 
(preferably within walking distance) that I could get some decent meals 
(breakfast/dinner) while I'm there.

Unless this is a topic of general interest to the group, it'd probably be best 
to reply to me directly rather than post responses to the list.

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

Delay Lines (Was: Univac I memory tank)

[Rick Bensene via cctalk]

Dwight wrote:

> The Olivetti used a piece of wire for the delay line. 

The Programma 101  indeed used a delay line.  Such delay lines use
magnetostrictive means to push a torque pulse into one end of the wire,
as well as detect a torque twist at the other end of the wire.
Magnetostrictive materials are typically a metal alloy that lengthens or
shortens depending on the polarity of an external magnetic field, and
will also generate a small magnetic field if stretched or compressed.

In a magnetostrictive delay line thin strips of magnetostrictive metal
are attached to opposite points tangential to the circumference of the
end of a nickel-alloy(typically) wire.  These strips, for whatever
reason, are typically called "tapes".

Each tape has a small coil of magnet wire surrounding it, wound
oppositely around each tape, such that when a short current pulse is
sent into the coils, one tape momentarily lengthens, and the other tape
contracts, causing a slight but sharp twisting torque to be applied to
the wire. This acts to transmit a pulse of energy into the wire.  The
torque twist mechanically travels through the wire to the other end,
where it causes one tape to lengthen slightly, and the other to compress
slightly, which induces a small current pulse into the coils around the
tapes, which can be amplified to match the electrical characteristics of
the original pulse. Sending a current pulse through the coils in one
direction causes the twist to occur clockwise, and the pulse going the
other direction induces a counter-clockwise twist, allowing ones and
zeros to be pushed into the wire as clockwise or counter-clockwise
torque twists.

The amount of time that elapses (delay)  from the pulse being injected
to being received at the other end of the wire is based on the
metallurgy of the wire, and its length.   The wire is capable of
remembering some number of torque twists  as bits, with a clockwise
torque, for example, representing a one, and a counter-clockwise twist
representing a zero.   

The wire was typically arranged in a spiral inside a metal housing.
Silicone or rubber supports supported the wire without attenuating the
torque pulses in the wire.In some cases, there were "taps" along the
length of the wire that used the same transducer method to pick off bits
at different delay periods. 

The use of such delay line technology in calculators arose  out of the
need to store a moderate number of bits to represent the working
registers of the calculator.  At the time, magnetic core memory was
still quite expensive, integrated circuit technology was in its infancy
and too expensive to use for mass storage in a calculator, and it was
generally cost and size prohibitive to store the bits required in
discrete transistor flip flop storage registers (though a few very early
electronic calculators did use this method).  

Given that delay line technology had been used with success on computers
(though the Univac I delay lines were very different than
magnetostrictive delay lines), they were a low cost, relatively simple
way to provide the small amount of storage required for an electronic
calculator.   A prime example of the use of magnetostrictive delay lines
in a computer was the Packard Bell 250, a low-cost "personal" computer
introduced in the early 1960's.

The bit-serial nature of the delay line was ideal for a calculator,
since a bit serial architecture is coincident with the most efficient
way to make an electronic calculator, where raw speed is not a
requirement, and minimizing the component count saves money.  The serial
nature of the delay line means that if a specific bit is needed, the
logic must wait around for the bit to arrive at the end of the delay
line.   This slows down the operation of the device, but in the case of
a calculator, where results are subject to human perception, 10s to
100's of milliseconds is well within the acceptable time for a
calculation to occur.

> I forget what the Dielh Combitron used but I know it used a two delay
lines. One was for registers and the other was for lookup tables that
loaded at turn on time from a metal tape ( as I recall ).

The Diehl Combitron did use two separate delay lines, one for the
registers(as well as learn-mode program storage) as mentioned, but the
other one wasn't really for lookup tables, but instead stored the
operating microcode that made the machine run.   The microcode was
indeed loaded from a punched metal tape at power-on time.   The
ingenious design of the Combitron was done by Dr. Stanley Frankel, a
nuclear physicist who was deeply involved in the mathematical modeling
that made the atom and hydrogen bombs possible.  After the Manhattan
project ended, he was involved in the design of quite a few computers
and calculators.  Notable computers that he designed were the
Librascope-General Precision LGP-30, the aforementioned Packard Bell
250, and some design work on early General Electric computers.   He also
designed the Smit