Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Eric Smith via cctalk]

On Wed, Feb 24, 2021 at 7:06 AM Chris Zach via cctalk 
wrote:

> Yes, the TM02 and TM03 formatters allowed MASSBUS to connect to Pertec
> drives, but I don't think you could run a tape drive and a disk drive on
> the same MASSBUS channel anyway. Wonder why, technically the MASSBUS
> cable is just an extension of the Unibus, so it shouldn't matter much
> what combination of cables you used. Maybe they just wrote different
> drivers or something.
>

There's nothing in the hardware that prevents it from being done, but DEC
OSes don't support it, and it's generally not a good idea. Tape activity
would block disk activity, because it doesn't have anything like modern
"tagged command queuing".

Re: Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

[Gavin Scott via cctalk]

On Wed, Feb 24, 2021 at 10:07 PM Al Kossow via cctalk
 wrote:
> The worst were the Fry's sales people on the floor that would ignore you, 
> then badger
> you to let them write a sale up so they'd get sales credit if you made the 
> mistake
> of asking them where something was.

And of course that process required them to get you over to the
computer, ask for your phone number, enter the item#, and wait for the
LaserJet to spit out the proto-invoice. The dumb/lazy ones would then
hand you the paper along with the item and tell you to show it to the
cashier. Of course you had the item so you could just throw the paper
away and they would get nothing. The crafty ones though would give you
the invoice and then walk the item up to behind the register area
where the cashier would have to go retrieve it so you were stuck.
Basically you wanted to avoid interacting with them if possible.

The fact that most stores had the ability to have 80 active cashiers
has to be some sort of record, though I don't think I ever saw the
registers on the far side get much use even at Christmas.

And then there was the "Fry's seal of quality" as we called the
return/restock slip plastered to items on the shelf that had already
been returned (at least) once. No sane person ever touched those
unless completely desperate.

My first Fry's story though comes from the early 1980s when I was
visiting HP in Cupertino and went to the original Sunnyvale Fry's and
only had a check for payment and they weren't going to take an out of
town check until they asked what I was in the bay area for and I said
"visiting HP" and then it was "oh, that will be fine then". It says
something about HP's reputation at the time that even their customers
were considered more trustworthy by a Fry's manager.

I also remember on that visit that the aisle-long magazine rack at
Fry's had many different nerdy publications but only two which rated
an entire double column of rack slots. They were Byte and Penthouse
IIRC.

We all had a love/hate relationship with Fry's, but they were an
institution and will be missed.

Re: Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

[Al Kossow via cctalk]

On 2/24/21 8:29 PM, jim stephens via cctalk wrote:



there won't be much of any liquidation sales 


because they hadn't been paying vendors, who took all their stuff back

that's why the shelves were empty, no one would give them any stock after
that started to happen well over a year ago

Re: Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

[jim stephens via cctalk]

On 2/24/2021 8:07 PM, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:


The worst were the Fry's sales people on the floor that would ignore 
you, then badger
you to let them write a sale up so they'd get sales credit if you made 
the mistake

of asking them where something was.

I always track down the Microcenter guys to get one of them to put one 
of their tags on my stuff, even the small stuff.  They are usually 
helpful or will find someone if they don't know.  I never ran into any @ 
Frys, as when I was going there, I always knew where things were, or 
just wondered till I found it if they moved it.


The real collapse is the swap meets where the vendors could dump their 
quota merchandise that they had to take to maintain pricing structures.  
That channel was BS, but at least in southern CA there were a few swap 
meets with vendors who would bring a lot of stuff to sell.  Then you 
could get the odds and ends @ a Frys run later in the afternoon after lunch.


I quit going because I couldn't walk well, and there were no scooters or 
places I could take a spell to rest and continue.


I'll miss the one in Anaheim that had the Space Shuttle theme (closed 
quite some time ago).  The one in Fountain Valley was smaller, but I had 
transitioned to buying via online and Microcenter runs plus direct from 
China quite a while ago.


Still miss them as that capability in the community means there will be 
less tinkering and work (and probably is) than there was.


Though a lot of the business damage was self inflicted on themselves.

One thing that the reporting so far on the subject misses, though people 
talk about it is that there won't be much of any liquidation sales as 
there is probably little left of any merchandise to liquidate.  That's 
how you go out of business, not in the case COVID.


thanks
Jim

Re: Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

[Chuck Guzis via cctalk]

On 2/24/21 7:51 PM, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:
> On 2/24/21 7:38 PM, Chuck Guzis via cctalk wrote:
> 
>> The cashiers, of course, were minimum-wage and so had no idea of what
>> was passing in front of them.
> 
> They also had a no questions asked returns policy, which people abused.
> 
> When something was returned, they'd rebag it and put it back on the shelf.

Definitely saw my share of that.

--Chuck

Re: Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

[Al Kossow via cctalk]

The worst were the Fry's sales people on the floor that would ignore you, then 
badger
you to let them write a sale up so they'd get sales credit if you made the 
mistake
of asking them where something was.

Re: Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

[Al Kossow via cctalk]

On 2/24/21 7:38 PM, Chuck Guzis via cctalk wrote:


The cashiers, of course, were minimum-wage and so had no idea of what
was passing in front of them.


They also had a no questions asked returns policy, which people abused.

When something was returned, they'd rebag it and put it back on the shelf.

Re: Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

[Chuck Guzis via cctalk]

On 2/24/21 6:11 PM, Fred Cisin via cctalk wrote:

> But, I remember the old days, when they had lots of "computer people"
> food items, and even Jolt cola.

You're forgetting Canfield Diet Fudge Chocolate Soda--I remember
customers wheeling out dollies of the stuff.The idea was simplicity
itself--traditional computer stores had very high sales margins.  John
Fry figured that if he could run a store in the middle of Silicon Valley
with thin margins (like the grocery business), it was a shoo-in for
success.  They also had various snacks to appeal to the lunchtime crowd.

I still have quite a few bagged connectors from Fry's with the
red-and-white labels.  In 1983, how could you beat 59 cents for a
gold-plated card edge connector?   Lots of parts on pegboards;
occasionally a factory rep would show up during lunchtime to demonstrate
a piece of test equipment.   One of the few retail establishments that
stocked VME cards.  Fry's flogged a lot of Everex stuff in the PC
department.

The cashiers, of course, were minimum-wage and so had no idea of what
was passing in front of them.  But the sales people were little better,
so if you knew exactly what you wanted, it was a glorious place.  If you
were looking for information, not so much.

This was all at the flagship Sunnyvale store.   Somewhat later, they
opened up stores in Fremont and Palo Alto, which were quite a bit more
polished.

But this is when Silicon Valley still hosted outfits that actually made
things...

--Chuck

Re: Re: Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

[Fred Cisin via cctalk]

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/funky-electronics-chain-frys-is-no-more/


They could probably have hung on a little longer, by stocking those empty 
shelves with toilet paper, and maybe even some groceries.



It has been many years since I was in a Fry's, because there weren't any 
very close.  Last time that I went in, I just wanted an ordinary PC 
printer cable (DB25 to blue ribbon 36 (often inaccurately called a 
"Centronics" connector))
The clerk was sure that there had ever been any printer cables 
other than USB.



A friend bought some discounted returned items.  Then he found out that 
returned defective items were simply reshelved until one of the future 
buyers didn't bother to bring them back again.  Often without even 
confirming that all parts were present.



But, I remember the old days, when they had lots of "computer people" food 
items, and even Jolt cola.



--
Grumpy Ol' Fred ci...@xenosoft.com

Re: Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

[Zane Healy via cctalk]

> On Feb 24, 2021, at 10:08 AM, Guy N. via cctalk  wrote:
> 
> https://www.seattletimes.com/business/funky-electronics-chain-frys-is-no-more/
> 
> So sad to see them go.  There was a Fry's store close enough for me to
> visit occasionally.  What will I do now when I actually want to examine
> the merchandise before I pay for it?

You man not be able to examine the merchandise the next time.  Just how hard it 
has gotten to go into a store and see a product before you buy it really hit 
home this last weekend.  My wife and I were trying to look at laptops, the only 
place left in the area to really see anything seems to be Best Buy. I found 
myself really wishing CompUSA was still around.  We didn’t bother to even 
consider going down to Fry’s, as a year ago, they were nothing but aisles of 
empty shelves.

Zane

Re: List your old computer

[Paul Koning via cctalk]

> On Feb 24, 2021, at 7:01 PM, Chuck Guzis via cctalk  
> wrote:
> 
> On 2/24/21 3:11 PM, Pete Turnbull via cctalk wrote:
>> On 24/02/2021 23:02, stan via cctalk wrote:
>>> By any chance, are you thinking of uptimes.net?
>>> Some years ago (early 2000's?) it was tracking systems uptimes. I had
>>> an Alpha  system talking to it at one time.
>>> 
>>> IIRC, the record at one time was a VAX cluster, with an uptime of
>>> 1200+ days. Windows NT systems fared a lot worse, average of about 40
>>> some days
> 
> A modern MCU running Linux with battery backup could beat that easily.
> 
> And probably be faster than the VAX.
> 
> How far we've come...
> 
> --Chuck

Not a general purpose computer, but some SAN storage arrays (clustered storage) 
I helped create have logged uptimes measured in years.  Those have MIPS engines 
and NetBSD as one of the two operating systems (with large modifications).

paul

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Paul Koning via cctalk]

> On Feb 24, 2021, at 7:06 PM, Noel Chiappa via cctalk  
> wrote:
> 
>> From: Chris Zach
> 
>> technically the MASSBUS cable is just an extension of the Unibus
> 
> No.
> 
> For one thing, the MASSBUS has no lines for carrying memory addresses. So
> there is no way to even build a box that 'translates' MASSBUS to UNIBUS; the
> semantics ('the things you can say', basically) of the two busses are so very
> different.

It's faintly true if you look at the Massbus adapter, rather than the cable.  
But only faintly.  There's a good reason why the big disks on many DEC machines 
were Massbus devices until MSCP arrived.  It's quite clear on Unibus PDP-11s, 
which needed Massbus both for speed and for a cleaner answer to more-than-18 
bit addressing.

paul

Re: FW: List your old computer

[Santo Nucifora via cctalk]

Looks a little different since the last time I looked around that feature
(it was a while back) but I think it may be this site?

https://www.1000bit.it/

Santo

On Wed, Feb 24, 2021 at 7:32 PM Kevin Parker via cctalk <
cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote:

> Thanks Stan - no it wasn’t anything to do with uptime. It was like a
> museum but people registered/listed their machines with some info about
> them and some pictures.
>
>
> Kevin Parker
>
> -Original Message-
> From: cctalk  On Behalf Of stan via cctalk
> Sent: Thursday, 25 February 2021 10:02 AM
> To: cctalk@classiccmp.org
> Subject: Re: FW: List your old computer
>
> By any chance, are you thinking of uptimes.net?
> Some years ago (early 2000's?) it was tracking systems uptimes. I had an
> Alpha  system talking to it at one time.
>
> IIRC, the record at one time was a VAX cluster, with an uptime of 1200+
> days. Windows NT systems fared a lot worse, average of about 40 some
> days
>
> Stan
>
>
> On 2021-02-24 2:02 a.m., Kevin Parker via cctalk wrote:
> > My apologies for the tracker embedded in my original post. I use it
> > for my business and forgot to remove it before posting to this list.
> >
> >
> > Kevin Parker
> >
> > -Original Message-
> > From: cctalk  On Behalf Of Kevin Parker
> > via cctalk
> > Sent: Wednesday, 24 February 2021 6:00 PM
> > To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'
> > 
> > Subject: List your old computer
> >
> > Hi folks - there used to be a web site where you could register and
> > list your "classic/old computer(s)". I'm not looking to do that but am
> > trying to find something from years gone by that I think was on that
> site.
> >
> > I thought it was https://www.old-computers.com/ or
> > http://oldcomputers.net/ but it's neither of those.
> >
> > My googlefoo has been unable to track it down assuming it still
> > exists. I know at one stage the owner was thinking of closing it down
> > because of hacks or spamming of forms or something like that.
> >
> > Does this ring a bell with anyone?
> >
> > Thank you!!
> >
> > Kevin Parker
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >  > 1_k-L-
> > 1qZM43W3s0v_y2M0f8BF4c2NfHml5Hf6Bq4h603?si=84908274=cece28e
> > b-2dfe
> > -4230-a422-38cd80fce8ae>
> >
> >
>
>

Re: FW: List your old computer

[Jon Elson via cctalk]

On 02/24/2021 06:01 PM, Chuck Guzis via cctalk wrote:

On 2/24/21 3:11 PM, Pete Turnbull via cctalk wrote:

On 24/02/2021 23:02, stan via cctalk wrote:

By any chance, are you thinking of uptimes.net?
Some years ago (early 2000's?) it was tracking systems uptimes. I had
an Alpha  system talking to it at one time.

IIRC, the record at one time was a VAX cluster, with an uptime of
1200+ days. Windows NT systems fared a lot worse, average of about 40
some days

A modern MCU running Linux with battery backup could beat that easily.

And probably be faster than the VAX.

How far we've come...

Faster?  The only comparison I have is between my KA630-AA 
and my current desktop (Dell Optiplex 980) running Ubuntu.  
It seems to be almost 1000 X faster.  I have a program that 
records environmental data every 15 seconds.  Then, there 
are programs that condense and summarize the data.  The 
whole run at the end of the year used to take about 30 
minutes.  It runs in about 5 SECONDS on the PC.  (Yes, I 
know, only 360 X.)


Jon

Re: List your old computer

[Tom Owad via cctalk]

> On Feb 24, 2021, at 6:11 PM, Pete Turnbull via cctalk  
> wrote:
> I never got close to 1200 days, but I had an SGI machine at home talking to 
> uptimes.net.  I remember watching it from work as it got close to 1 hours 
> (on the 416th day, 19th November 2002 according to syslog) when suddenly it 
> went off the air.  It turned out the electricity provider had (accidentally) 
> tripped the wrong breaker in the local substation.  Grr.

Is there anybody still running a service like uptimes.net 
? That sounds like fun.

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Noel Chiappa via cctalk]

> From: Chris Zach

> technically the MASSBUS cable is just an extension of the Unibus

No.

For one thing, the MASSBUS has no lines for carrying memory addresses. So
there is no way to even build a box that 'translates' MASSBUS to UNIBUS; the
semantics ('the things you can say', basically) of the two busses are so very
different.

(The MASSBUS is actually two separate busses; a control bus, and a data bus.
The former has 5 lines for 'register address', but that's all. While the
control bus is asynchronous, the data bus is synchronous.)

Noel

Re: FW: List your old computer

[Chuck Guzis via cctalk]

On 2/24/21 3:11 PM, Pete Turnbull via cctalk wrote:
> On 24/02/2021 23:02, stan via cctalk wrote:
>> By any chance, are you thinking of uptimes.net?
>> Some years ago (early 2000's?) it was tracking systems uptimes. I had
>> an Alpha  system talking to it at one time.
>>
>> IIRC, the record at one time was a VAX cluster, with an uptime of
>> 1200+ days. Windows NT systems fared a lot worse, average of about 40
>> some days

A modern MCU running Linux with battery backup could beat that easily.

And probably be faster than the VAX.

How far we've come...

--Chuck

RE: FW: List your old computer

[Kevin Parker via cctalk]

Thanks Stan - no it wasn’t anything to do with uptime. It was like a museum but 
people registered/listed their machines with some info about them and some 
pictures. 


Kevin Parker

-Original Message-
From: cctalk  On Behalf Of stan via cctalk
Sent: Thursday, 25 February 2021 10:02 AM
To: cctalk@classiccmp.org
Subject: Re: FW: List your old computer

By any chance, are you thinking of uptimes.net?
Some years ago (early 2000's?) it was tracking systems uptimes. I had an Alpha  
system talking to it at one time.

IIRC, the record at one time was a VAX cluster, with an uptime of 1200+ days. 
Windows NT systems fared a lot worse, average of about 40 some days

Stan


On 2021-02-24 2:02 a.m., Kevin Parker via cctalk wrote:
> My apologies for the tracker embedded in my original post. I use it 
> for my business and forgot to remove it before posting to this list.
> 
> 
> Kevin Parker
> 
> -Original Message-
> From: cctalk  On Behalf Of Kevin Parker 
> via cctalk
> Sent: Wednesday, 24 February 2021 6:00 PM
> To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'
> 
> Subject: List your old computer
> 
> Hi folks - there used to be a web site where you could register and 
> list your "classic/old computer(s)". I'm not looking to do that but am  
> trying to find something from years gone by that I think was on that site.
> 
> I thought it was https://www.old-computers.com/ or 
> http://oldcomputers.net/ but it's neither of those.
> 
> My googlefoo has been unable to track it down assuming it still 
> exists. I know at one stage the owner was thinking of closing it down 
> because of hacks or spamming of forms or something like that.
> 
> Does this ring a bell with anyone?
> 
> Thank you!!
> 
> Kevin Parker
> 
> 
> 
>   
>  1_k-L- 
> 1qZM43W3s0v_y2M0f8BF4c2NfHml5Hf6Bq4h603?si=84908274=cece28e
> b-2dfe
> -4230-a422-38cd80fce8ae>
> 
> 

Re: FW: List your old computer

[Pete Turnbull via cctalk]

On 24/02/2021 23:02, stan via cctalk wrote:

By any chance, are you thinking of uptimes.net?
Some years ago (early 2000's?) it was tracking systems uptimes. I had an 
Alpha  system talking to it at one time.


IIRC, the record at one time was a VAX cluster, with an uptime of 1200+ 
days. Windows NT systems fared a lot worse, average of about 40 some 
days


I never got close to 1200 days, but I had an SGI machine at home talking 
to uptimes.net.  I remember watching it from work as it got close to 
1 hours (on the 416th day, 19th November 2002 according to syslog) 
when suddenly it went off the air.  It turned out the electricity 
provider had (accidentally) tripped the wrong breaker in the local 
substation.  Grr.


--
Pete Turnbull

Re: FW: List your old computer

[stan via cctalk]

By any chance, are you thinking of uptimes.net?
Some years ago (early 2000's?) it was tracking systems uptimes. I had an 
Alpha  system talking to it at one time.


IIRC, the record at one time was a VAX cluster, with an uptime of 1200+ 
days. Windows NT systems fared a lot worse, average of about 40 some 
days


Stan


On 2021-02-24 2:02 a.m., Kevin Parker via cctalk wrote:

My apologies for the tracker embedded in my original post. I use it for my
business and forgot to remove it before posting to this list.


Kevin Parker

-Original Message-
From: cctalk  On Behalf Of Kevin Parker via
cctalk
Sent: Wednesday, 24 February 2021 6:00 PM
To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'

Subject: List your old computer

Hi folks - there used to be a web site where you could register and list
your "classic/old computer(s)". I'm not looking to do that but am  trying to
find something from years gone by that I think was on that site.

I thought it was https://www.old-computers.com/ or http://oldcomputers.net/
but it's neither of those.

My googlefoo has been unable to track it down assuming it still exists. I
know at one stage the owner was thinking of closing it down because of hacks
or spamming of forms or something like that.

Does this ring a bell with anyone?

Thank you!!

Kevin Parker



  

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Al Kossow via cctalk]

Do you have 3-phase power?  Will they even spin up?


I do, but I don't care enough about them to try.
I just want them gone. Bring your own fork lift, the battery in mine is dead
and they are 15 feet up.

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Paul Koning via cctalk]

> On Feb 24, 2021, at 9:06 AM, Chris Zach via cctalk  
> wrote:
> 
>> I happen to have a massbus adapter and the cabling with terminator for my 
>> 11/750, but I never came across any massbus peripherals. Considering the 
>> price back then and the size for these, they seem nowadays quite rare, which 
>> is a real pity.
> 
> Sort of. MASSBUS was a very overpriced and to be honest weird system that DEC 
> developed in an attempt to be like IBM and charge very high markups for 
> generic peripherals. While it did support a variety of interface formats (I 
> don't think the RS03 and 04 were SMD, and I know the RP07 was *not* SMD) the 
> industry quickly centered on SMD and that was that.

Overpriced?  Compared to what?  SMD didn't appear until later; I know Massbus 
existed in 1974, perhaps earlier.  What else would do the job back then?

> Yes, the TM02 and TM03 formatters allowed MASSBUS to connect to Pertec 
> drives, but I don't think you could run a tape drive and a disk drive on the 
> same MASSBUS channel anyway. Wonder why, technically the MASSBUS cable is 
> just an extension of the Unibus, so it shouldn't matter much what combination 
> of cables you used. Maybe they just wrote different drivers or something.

Electrically it works.  I believe at least one system/OS supports this; TOPS-10 
perhaps?  But most operating systems do not, and yes, that would be a driver 
issue.

Similarly, not all OS support RS03/04 and RM/RP on the same Massbus (RSTS 
doesn't for example).

Meanwhile, speaking of the RP07: DEC never supported that on any PDP-11, but it 
actually works just fine on the high performance Massbus of the 11/70.  In the 
RSTS group we had one on the big 11/70 system ("ARK" because at one point it 
had "two of everything").  So RSTS/E will happily drive such a device, if you 
can manage to power it up.

>> ...
> 
> (Yes, I did use a MASSBUS cable to tow a car once. Worked fine)

:-)  I think IBM's "bus and tag" 360 channel cables are even thicker than a 
Massbus cable.

> I still have an RM80 drive in my house here, I fire it up every 5 years or 
> so. Mostly for when I get my Decsystem/20 back together.
> 
> It has the RM80 personality module which is the difference between the R80 
> and RM80. To be honest I'd bet that one could put an RA81 personality module 
> into it and make an RA80 drive
> 
> Far more interesting would be to see if one could put the RM80 personality 
> module into an RA81 drive and turn that into a 456mb MASSBUS drive. THAT 
> would be interesting

Yes, but you'd need some driver work, since Massbus disk drivers have to deal 
with the actual drive topology.  So you'd have to define a Massbus ID value for 
"RM81" and pick the appropriate sector/head/cylinder count.  Depending on the 
OS this may be fairly easy or not so easy.  I know how to do it in RSTS (at the 
source level -- doing it by patches might also be doable).

paul

Re: SaturnCalc, Graph, and WP disks uploaded

[Mattis Lind via cctalk]

onsdag 24 februari 2021 skrev Chris Zach via cctalk :

> They are RT11/TSX versions.
>
> Now for the problem of the day. The TSX 5.1 distribution  have damage to
> track zero, my guess is they were in the Solarex drives where the wonderful
> silicon dust did a job on them. Anyone got really good 8 inch floppy skills
> and want to take a crack at reading them?


As far as I understand RX01/RX02 disks are not using track 0 at all. You
should be able to splice in track 0 from a working RX disk.

/Mattis


>
> C
>

Re: archive of DEC Notes

[Paul Koning via cctalk]

> On Feb 24, 2021, at 9:08 AM, Antonio Carlini via cctalk 
>  wrote:
> 
> On 24/02/2021 03:26, Eric Smith via cctalk wrote:
>> Does anyone have contact information for the proprietor of this site:
>> http://www.activityclub.org/decnotes/
>> The site has an index of messages archived from DEC's internal "Notes"
>> (kind of their equivalent of UseNet).
>> 
>> It appears from the "Download this site" page that at one time it was
>> possible to download an archive of the actual content, but the hosting used
>> for that only provides one week of free hosting, which has expired.
>> 
>> I don't need the entire archive (though I'd like to get it), but I'd
>> especially like to get messages from milkwy::23class_semiconductor and
>> ricks::decschips.
> 
> Well if they ever show up, I'd be interested :-).
> 
> 
> That archive was largely incomplete: it had the message titles but very few 
> of the actual messages. There were some rather harsh negative comments on an 
> FB group when someone pointed to it. Obviously some people thought that when 
> they were writing their original comments that they would be kept private to 
> the 100,000+ Digital employees :-)

The more significant issue may be that DEC, and its successor companies, might 
have objections to the public posting of company confidential material.

Too bad only a few things were archived.  I looked for myself and found exactly 
one notesfile ("fddi") with saved content, which made for some fun reading.  
But other notesfiles that would actually be more interesting at this stage, 
like ones about RSTS, aren't archived.

I wonder if anyone has the full archive dump.  If so I'd love to have that.

paul

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Jon Elson via cctalk]

On 02/24/2021 12:26 PM, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:
I have two RP07s sitting on the upper mezanine here that 
were left behind by the former tennant of the

building my shop is in.


Do you have 3-phase power?  Will they even spin up?


Jon

RE: SaturnCalc, Graph, and WP disks uploaded

[Mark Matlock via cctalk]

Hi all!
Spent some serious time this evening with the RX02 drives: I managed to 
download the images of the SaturnCalc 3.0, Saturn Graph, and Saturn WP 
software to RX02 images. I think it's set right, can someone take a look 
at the images and see if they are good? Should be RT11 format, RX02 (of 
course), I recorded from both sides of the disks (they're double sided, 
hole punched by the vendor) and are at
https://www.crystel.com/bob
You should see the disks and the meta files.
Let me know if they work, I need to get to bed. Either burn them on real 
RX02's or read them with a SIMH image.
C

Chris,
   I am very interested in Saturn Calc for PDP-11s specifically for RSX.
I downloaded your floppies and will take a look at them soon. You mention
that they are in RT-11 format. Do you know which PDP-11 OS the Saturn
software was for. They had versions also for RT-11, TSX and RSTS. Later
they had native VMS and MSDOS versions.
There are images of RX50s for RSX Saturn Calc, Graph and WPS at 
Malcolm’s web site. 

https://avitech.com.au/?page_id=2570 

   He also gave me some documentation that I have scanned and put up at

http://www.rsx11m.com/SaturnInstall.pdf 


http://www.rsx11m.com/SaturnCalc.pdf 

http://www.rsx11m.com/SaturnCalcRef.pdf 


   Saturn products on the PDP-11 and VMS used their own license key
systems. I do have valid licenses for Calc and Graph for VMS and have
them running on a MV3100-80. It would be great to get the RSX version
running. I used it extensively back in the day and it would be wonderful
to preserve it.

Best,
Mark Matlock

Re: SaturnCalc, Graph, and WP disks uploaded

[Chris Zach via cctalk]

They are RT11/TSX versions.

Now for the problem of the day. The TSX 5.1 distribution floppies have 
damage to track zero, my guess is they were in the Solarex drives where 
the wonderful silicon dust did a job on them. Anyone got really good 8 
inch floppy skills and want to take a crack at reading them?


C

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Al Kossow via cctalk]

I have two RP07s sitting on the upper mezanine here that were left behind by 
the former tennant of the
building my shop is in.

Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

[Guy N. via cctalk]

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/funky-electronics-chain-frys-is-no-more/

So sad to see them go.  There was a Fry's store close enough for me to
visit occasionally.  What will I do now when I actually want to examine
the merchandise before I pay for it?

Re: VAX 11/750

[Bill Gunshannon via cctalk]

On 2/23/21 10:57 PM, Ethan Dicks via cctalk wrote:

On Tue, Feb 23, 2021 at 9:53 PM Chris Zach via cctalk
 wrote:

Wow, I've always wanted an 11/750. Not sure why, the small box size is
impressive and all that.


I started on an 11/750 in 1984.  They are fantastic little machines.
If you only have 3-4 users on them, they are quite peppy.



At least  until one of them fires up Eunice or the Ada Compiler. :-)

750 was my first VAX and first VMS machine, too.

bill

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Chris Zach via cctalk]

Well, I had a 
program that could examine the home blocks, and I knew where to find the 
backup home blocks.  So, I hacked that program to copy the backup block 
to the main one, and then change the checksums to agree.


That is one way to avoid a very long restore :-)

The other issue is the voice coil could suck dirty air in during long 
seeks, so they had ti replace the HDA and put a filter over the air 
exhaust from the voice coil.


Yes, they had issues. Another one apparently is the heads will glue 
themselves to the drive after a few years, I was researching ways to 
unstick the heads without damaging them (hint: Never use Isopropyl to 
clean a RM03 disk head. It will unglue it and hilarity will result) but 
that whole thing was mooted when it vanished.


MASSBUS was not anything like a UNIBUS, it was a lot closer to an IBM 
channel bus and tag cable.


Ok, however the address and data bus feels a lot like a Unibus. And all 
of the registers are in the drive controller/adapters, it almost feels 
like you are tickling the adapter directly off the Unibus. Given Dec's 
joy with Unibus repeaters, bridges and windows it does feel like a 
window into the Unibus itself.


C

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Chris Zach via cctalk]

Yep. I actually had one. The lid flew off the top of it while we were 
driving it back from Eastern shore to Baltimore on Rt. 50 but the rest 
of it was intact. Very different MBA controller from an RM02/03.


Unfortunately when Doug closed up the storage place someone swiped MC 
from there before I could pick it up, and at the same time the RP07 
vanished. I'm guessing that the 07 was junked as MC has resurfaced in a 
museum.


CZ

hhh, the RP07!  I have stories about that drive!
It was a Burroughs mainframe drive they reprogrammed for DEC.  It had a 
number of issues.
The worst one was that due to some microcode bugs, it was possible to 
trash an occasional track descriptor record. When a bad TDR was read, 
the drive totally locked up, you had to cycle power to reset it.  VMS 
recovered from it quite gracefully, however.  They finally fixed it, it 
required replacing about 10 boards.  Then, there was a procedure to 
rewrite all the TDRs.  The DEC FE assured me it would not touch user 
data.  Well, after running the procedure, it came up as a blank disk!  
YIKES!  A quick check at the binary level showed data was still on the 
drive, but the RMS-11 home block had been overwritten.  Well, I had a 
program that could examine the home blocks, and I knew where to find the 
backup home blocks.  So, I hacked that program to copy the backup block 
to the main one, and then change the checksums to agree.


The other issue is the voice coil could suck dirty air in during long 
seeks, so they had ti replace the HDA and put a filter over the air 
exhaust from the voice coil.
Yes, the TM02 and TM03 formatters allowed MASSBUS to connect to Pertec 
drives, but I don't think you could run a tape drive and a disk drive 
on the same MASSBUS channel anyway. Wonder why, technically the 
MASSBUS cable is just an extension of the Unibus, so it shouldn't 
matter much what combination of cables you used. Maybe they just wrote 
different drivers or something.


MASSBUS was not anything like a UNIBUS, it was a lot closer to an IBM 
channel bus and tag cable.
Anybody knows if there was conversion kit to equip CDC 9762 and 9766 
type SMD drives into MASSBUS drives much like the TU81 could be 
turned into a TA81 (SDI)?



Well, just the guts inside an RM05, that was a 9762 drive relabeled by DEC.

Jon

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Nigel Johnson via cctalk]

On 2021-02-24 11:06 a.m., Jon Elson via cctalk wrote:
> On 02/24/2021 08:06 AM, Chris Zach via cctalk wrote:
>>
>> Sort of. MASSBUS was a very overpriced and to be honest weird system
>> that DEC developed in an attempt to be like IBM and charge very high
>> markups for generic peripherals. While it did support a variety of
>> interface formats (I don't think the RS03 and 04 were SMD, and I know
>> the RP07 was *not* SMD) the industry quickly centered on SMD and that
>> was that.
>>
> hhh, the RP07!  I have stories about that drive!
> It was a Burroughs mainframe drive they reprogrammed for DEC.  It had
> a number of issues.
> The worst one was that due to some microcode bugs, it was possible to
> trash an occasional track descriptor record.  When a bad TDR was read,
> the drive totally locked up, you had to cycle power to reset it.  VMS
> recovered from it quite gracefully, however.  They finally fixed it,
> it required replacing about 10 boards.  Then, there was a procedure to
> rewrite all the TDRs.  The DEC FE assured me it would not touch user
> data.  Well, after running the procedure, it came up as a blank disk! 
> YIKES!  A quick check at the binary level showed data was still on the
> drive, but the RMS-11 home block had been overwritten.  Well, I had a
> program that could examine the home blocks, and I knew where to find
> the backup home blocks.  So, I hacked that program to copy the backup
> block to the main one, and then change the checksums to agree.
>
> The other issue is the voice coil could suck dirty air in during long
> seeks, so they had ti replace the HDA and put a filter over the air
> exhaust from the voice coil.
>> Yes, the TM02 and TM03 formatters allowed MASSBUS to connect to
>> Pertec drives, but I don't think you could run a tape drive and a
>> disk drive on the same MASSBUS channel anyway. Wonder why,
>> technically the MASSBUS cable is just an extension of the Unibus, so
>> it shouldn't matter much what combination of cables you used. Maybe
>> they just wrote different drivers or something.
>>
> MASSBUS was not anything like a UNIBUS, it was a lot closer to an IBM
> channel bus and tag cable.
>>> Anybody knows if there was conversion kit to equip CDC 9762 and 9766
>>> type SMD drives into MASSBUS drives much like the TU81 could be
>>> turned into a TA81 (SDI)?
>>
> Well, just the guts inside an RM05, that was a 9762 drive relabeled by
> DEC.
>
Actually the RM05 was a 9766 - the 9762 was an RM03 when DEC re-packaged it


> Jon

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Jon Elson via cctalk]

On 02/24/2021 08:06 AM, Chris Zach via cctalk wrote:


Sort of. MASSBUS was a very overpriced and to be honest 
weird system that DEC developed in an attempt to be like 
IBM and charge very high markups for generic peripherals. 
While it did support a variety of interface formats (I 
don't think the RS03 and 04 were SMD, and I know the RP07 
was *not* SMD) the industry quickly centered on SMD and 
that was that.



hhh, the RP07!  I have stories about that drive!
It was a Burroughs mainframe drive they reprogrammed for 
DEC.  It had a number of issues.
The worst one was that due to some microcode bugs, it was 
possible to trash an occasional track descriptor record.  
When a bad TDR was read, the drive totally locked up, you 
had to cycle power to reset it.  VMS recovered from it quite 
gracefully, however.  They finally fixed it, it required 
replacing about 10 boards.  Then, there was a procedure to 
rewrite all the TDRs.  The DEC FE assured me it would not 
touch user data.  Well, after running the procedure, it came 
up as a blank disk!  YIKES!  A quick check at the binary 
level showed data was still on the drive, but the RMS-11 
home block had been overwritten.  Well, I had a program that 
could examine the home blocks, and I knew where to find the 
backup home blocks.  So, I hacked that program to copy the 
backup block to the main one, and then change the checksums 
to agree.


The other issue is the voice coil could suck dirty air in 
during long seeks, so they had ti replace the HDA and put a 
filter over the air exhaust from the voice coil.
Yes, the TM02 and TM03 formatters allowed MASSBUS to 
connect to Pertec drives, but I don't think you could run 
a tape drive and a disk drive on the same MASSBUS channel 
anyway. Wonder why, technically the MASSBUS cable is just 
an extension of the Unibus, so it shouldn't matter much 
what combination of cables you used. Maybe they just wrote 
different drivers or something.


MASSBUS was not anything like a UNIBUS, it was a lot closer 
to an IBM channel bus and tag cable.
Anybody knows if there was conversion kit to equip CDC 
9762 and 9766 type SMD drives into MASSBUS drives much 
like the TU81 could be turned into a TA81 (SDI)?


Well, just the guts inside an RM05, that was a 9762 drive 
relabeled by DEC.


Jon

Re: VAX 11/750

[Mattis Lind via cctalk]

Den ons 24 feb. 2021 kl 04:57 skrev Ethan Dicks via cctalk <
cctalk@classiccmp.org>:

> On Tue, Feb 23, 2021 at 9:53 PM Chris Zach via cctalk
>  wrote:
> > Wow, I've always wanted an 11/750. Not sure why, the small box size is
> > impressive and all that.
>
> I started on an 11/750 in 1984.  They are fantastic little machines.
> If you only have 3-4 users on them, they are quite peppy.
>
> > However it doesn't look like that one has a MASSBUS adapter so I will
> have to pass...
>
> The module map indicates an SI 9400 interface (CMI card to an SI 9xxx
> SMD disk box) and an L0007, which is an RH750 MASSBUS adapter.  Those
> slots appear to be populated with _something_ in the photo.  There
> _might_ be a MASSBUS connector at the lower-right of the I/O bulkhead.
>
> The CPU area seems to show an FP750 Floating Point accelerator
> installed in slot 1.
>
> It also appears there are a couple of cards in the memory area in
> slots 6 and 8.  What I don't know, since I didn't have one, is how you
> load up a machine with an L0022 14MB memory controller, but it's
> _possible_ we are looking at 4x 1MB + 2x 4MB (full boat).
>

Looking at the pictures it seems that the two boards to the left in the
memory backlane are NOT M7199 4 Meg boards. Those boards seem to be more
like standard full size 11/750 boards but the connectors of those are very
different so they would not fit. I just wonder if someone put spare boards
there? It may be so that they are not pushed in fully and latched properly?
It is impossible to read the ID of the board but they sure look like L0008
microcode boards to me.

There are two boards in the CMI bus slots, one seems to be a third party
something and the other might as well be the L0007 MBA. It is likely since
it has three gate arrays in the correct area as is visible from the picture.

My 11/750 has six M8750 and two M7199 and the L0022 controller. I don't
know if three M7199 and two M8750 config is possible as well.

/Mattis


>
> Cheers,
>
> -ethan
>

Re: archive of DEC Notes

[Antonio Carlini via cctalk]

On 24/02/2021 03:26, Eric Smith via cctalk wrote:

Does anyone have contact information for the proprietor of this site:
 http://www.activityclub.org/decnotes/
The site has an index of messages archived from DEC's internal "Notes"
(kind of their equivalent of UseNet).

It appears from the "Download this site" page that at one time it was
possible to download an archive of the actual content, but the hosting used
for that only provides one week of free hosting, which has expired.

I don't need the entire archive (though I'd like to get it), but I'd
especially like to get messages from milkwy::23class_semiconductor and
ricks::decschips.


Well if they ever show up, I'd be interested :-).


That archive was largely incomplete: it had the message titles but very 
few of the actual messages. There were some rather harsh negative 
comments on an FB group when someone pointed to it. Obviously some 
people thought that when they were writing their original comments that 
they would be kept private to the 100,000+ Digital employees :-)



Anyway, if bitsavers ever wants to set up an archive of Notes 
conferences, then I'll go and dig out the ones I was hosting back in the 
day. There might be a few from the old MARVIN cluster too but nothing as 
interesting as the VAX or semiconductor conferences.



FWIW I think the person who originally saved those details might have 
been Paul S. Winalski, but that might be my memory playing tricks on me.



Antonio


--
Antonio Carlini
anto...@acarlini.com

Re: Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[Chris Zach via cctalk]

I happen to have a massbus adapter and the cabling with terminator for my 
11/750, but I never came across any massbus peripherals. Considering the price 
back then and the size for these, they seem nowadays quite rare, which is a 
real pity.


Sort of. MASSBUS was a very overpriced and to be honest weird system 
that DEC developed in an attempt to be like IBM and charge very high 
markups for generic peripherals. While it did support a variety of 
interface formats (I don't think the RS03 and 04 were SMD, and I know 
the RP07 was *not* SMD) the industry quickly centered on SMD and that 
was that.


Yes, the TM02 and TM03 formatters allowed MASSBUS to connect to Pertec 
drives, but I don't think you could run a tape drive and a disk drive on 
the same MASSBUS channel anyway. Wonder why, technically the MASSBUS 
cable is just an extension of the Unibus, so it shouldn't matter much 
what combination of cables you used. Maybe they just wrote different 
drivers or something.



Anybody knows if there was conversion kit to equip CDC 9762 and 9766 type SMD 
drives into MASSBUS drives much like the TU81 could be turned into a TA81 (SDI)?


I have heard that the difference between what comes out of a MBA (which 
is huge, several quad height boards in an interface box) and true SMD is 
the inversion of some differential signals. Whatever it is the changes 
to a 9762 were very minimal, probably just one of the cards in the card 
cage. It's quite possible there is no difference, I'll leave that to 
someone else.


My guess is they removed the TM03 formatter from the TU81 and just put 
in a SDI formatter which was nothing more than yet another closed source 
version of a Pertec formatter. Maybe DEC lost the contractor who built 
MASSBUS cables as they were better used to tie ships to a dock.


(Yes, I did use a MASSBUS cable to tow a car once. Worked fine)

I still have an RM80 drive in my house here, I fire it up every 5 years 
or so. Mostly for when I get my Decsystem/20 back together.


It has the RM80 personality module which is the difference between the 
R80 and RM80. To be honest I'd bet that one could put an RA81 
personality module into it and make an RA80 drive


Far more interesting would be to see if one could put the RM80 
personality module into an RA81 drive and turn that into a 456mb MASSBUS 
drive. THAT would be interesting


C

Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

[P Gebhardt via cctalk]

 Am Mittwoch, 24. Februar 2021, 03:53:19 MEZ hat Chris Zach via cctalk 
 Folgendes geschrieben: 


>Wow, I've always wanted an 11/750. Not sure why, the small box size is 
>impressive and all that. However it doesn't look like that one has a 
>MASSBUS adapter so I will have to pass...
>
>And I just gave away a M7850 memory board :-)
>
>C
>

I happen to have a massbus adapter and the cabling with terminator for my 
11/750, but I never came across any massbus peripherals. Considering the price 
back then and the size for these, they seem nowadays quite rare, which is a 
real pity.  
Anybody knows if there was conversion kit to equip CDC 9762 and 9766 type SMD 
drives into MASSBUS drives much like the TU81 could be turned into a TA81 (SDI)?

Cheers, 
Pierre


-
http://www.digitalheritage.de