[cctalk] Re: HP 9825A version of HPL / Roms
There are several videos about repairs to the 9825 and repairing the tape drive by Marc V. CuriousMarc) on YouTube. Don Resor Sent from someone's iPhone > On Apr 11, 2024, at 9:16 PM, Andre Lewis via cctalk > wrote: > > Thanks Paul, handy to know! > > I have a set of tapes that look to be in very good condition, with the > exception of the players capstan and the internal tape bands. Mine does > also look like it might have been expanded, so I'll see if I can identify > any upgrades. > > Thanks also for the note about the HP list! > > Regards, > Andre > >> On Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 5:48 PM Paul Berger via cctalk >> wrote: >> >> You may also wish to join the VintHPcom group on groups.io where a lot >> of HP 98xx users hang out. >> >> Paul. >> >> On 2024-04-11 8:54 p.m., Andre Lewis via cctalk wrote: >> >> >
[cctalk] Re: HP 9825A version of HPL / Roms
For rubber rollers many people swear by Terry’s Rubber Rollers. https://www.terrysrubberrollers.com/ Sent from my iPhone On Apr 11, 2024, at 21:16, Andre Lewis via cctalk wrote: Thanks Paul, handy to know! I have a set of tapes that look to be in very good condition, with the exception of the players capstan and the internal tape bands. Mine does also look like it might have been expanded, so I'll see if I can identify any upgrades. Thanks also for the note about the HP list! Regards, Andre On Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 5:48 PM Paul Berger via cctalk wrote: You may also wish to join the VintHPcom group on groups.io where a lot of HP 98xx users hang out. Paul. On 2024-04-11 8:54 p.m., Andre Lewis via cctalk wrote:
[cctalk] Re: HP 9825A version of HPL / Roms
Thanks Paul, handy to know! I have a set of tapes that look to be in very good condition, with the exception of the players capstan and the internal tape bands. Mine does also look like it might have been expanded, so I'll see if I can identify any upgrades. Thanks also for the note about the HP list! Regards, Andre On Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 5:48 PM Paul Berger via cctalk wrote: > You may also wish to join the VintHPcom group on groups.io where a lot > of HP 98xx users hang out. > > Paul. > > On 2024-04-11 8:54 p.m., Andre Lewis via cctalk wrote: > >
[cctalk] looking for HP 9836U color monitor
Northeast US roughly.
[cctalk] Re: HP 9825A version of HPL / Roms
You may also wish to join the VintHPcom group on groups.io where a lot of HP 98xx users hang out. Paul. On 2024-04-11 8:54 p.m., Andre Lewis via cctalk wrote:
[cctalk] Re: HP 9825A version of HPL / Roms
You will find many manuals for the 9825 at hpmuseum.net there is a manual for the base machine and manuals for each of the option ROMs. Usable tapes for the tape drive are very rare and for a 9825A there is only one option for diskettes the 9885. A machine that says 9825A on the outside may have been upgrades to a 9825B or T, the 9825T model is the most useful as it has the maximum memory and has a lot more options for mass storage. They are a fun machine I have had a few pass by me, but no longer have one as space constraints dictated I get rid of some of my hardware and I opted to kepp my 9835A. Paul. On 2024-04-11 8:54 p.m., Andre Lewis via cctalk wrote: Howdy all! I'm the new owner if one of the coolest "Calculators" HP ever made. Everything generally works but I would need a new capstan (rubber is now sticky) to use with the tape cartridge. I am running into a hard time tracking down information on using it though, so if anyone can help fill in some gaps, that would be great! I'm looking for: - A manual for HPL, the language used to calculate. Things like for loops don't seem to work, but 'dsp' 'gto' and variable assignment do. - Manuals for any and all of the cartridges, and how to use them - Ideas on replacing the capstan - Ideas on refurbing the tapes (there's a rubber band equivalent to drive the tape on both sides, these have lost their stretch) - Specs for the I/O, as I would love to make custom I/O for it. I would also love to be able to create new cartridges, but I'm not willing to sacrifice any of my existing cartridges to Reverse Engineer them. I have the Plotter / GPIO Cartridge, the Mateix cartridge and the Strings Advanced Programming. Trying to track down an Assembly cartridge or any others. Thanks! Any info is appreciated! ~ Andre
[cctalk] HP 9825A version of HPL / Roms
Howdy all! I'm the new owner if one of the coolest "Calculators" HP ever made. Everything generally works but I would need a new capstan (rubber is now sticky) to use with the tape cartridge. I am running into a hard time tracking down information on using it though, so if anyone can help fill in some gaps, that would be great! I'm looking for: - A manual for HPL, the language used to calculate. Things like for loops don't seem to work, but 'dsp' 'gto' and variable assignment do. - Manuals for any and all of the cartridges, and how to use them - Ideas on replacing the capstan - Ideas on refurbing the tapes (there's a rubber band equivalent to drive the tape on both sides, these have lost their stretch) - Specs for the I/O, as I would love to make custom I/O for it. I would also love to be able to create new cartridges, but I'm not willing to sacrifice any of my existing cartridges to Reverse Engineer them. I have the Plotter / GPIO Cartridge, the Mateix cartridge and the Strings Advanced Programming. Trying to track down an Assembly cartridge or any others. Thanks! Any info is appreciated! ~ Andre
[cctalk] Re: IBM 360
On Wed, 2024-04-10 at 23:52 -0500, CAREY SCHUG wrote: > I was an operator (summer job and weekends during college), we had a > bunch of model 30s, each with at least 2 card readers and 2 > printers. most work was BG or F1 running jcl which read in a 1401 > program from cards. My boss in my first full-time job had worked at a bank in Dayton, OH. They had an NCR 315, with a device called CRAM, or Card Random Access Machine. That machine used cards the same size as punch cards, but made of mylar and coated with mag-tape oxide. It had a compressed-air-driven mechanism to extract a particular card from a file, drag it through some read-write heads, and put it back. They loved the CRAM sort routines. The machine made a hell of a racket, so they had it in a sound-proof room. An IBM salesman convinced them to try out a 360/30 with a Data Cell. After a month, the salesman came back and noticed the Data Cell in the same sound-proof room as the CRAM. He asked "Why is it in there? It doesn't make any noise!" The answer was "We hope it will learn some software."
[cctalk] Re: 5150 mobo?
On 4/11/24 11:01, Fred Cisin via cctalk wrote: > Then, there was the "64-256KB" motherboard. It had one row of 4164s > soldered in, and three rows of sockets. Populating those with 4164s > gave you 256K of RAM. BUT, there was an empty socket on the board, that > you could populate; I don't know whether it was a PAL or some 74xx > logic, that then let you use two rows of 4164s (one row of which was > soldered in) and two rows of 41256, giving 640K! 640K was all of the > RAM that could be easily used, other than some upper memory space of the > other video or bits in between other stuff. Bipolar PROM. A few years ago, I published a way for one to use a 22V10 GAL as a substitute to fill in the D000 segment as well as the lower 640K by using 256Kb DRAM. Although the 22V10 is a 24 pin DIP and the PROM being replaced, 16, things could be arranged to let the "tail" end of the 22V10 hang out of the socket and have no changes made to the planar traces themselves. So completely reversible. --Chuck
[cctalk] Re: Cleanup time again
Clean the connectors and reseat the socketed chips and it will probably work. > On Apr 11, 2024, at 1:55 PM, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk > wrote: > > > > One last shot. > > I have an RX Floppy disk unit. Worked fine until one > time the last time I had it hooked up and after about > an hour it just stopped responding. All I get now is > the well known click-click on init and then nothing. I > am sure it is repairable either by troubleshooting or > just buying another boardset. > > Anybody interested? I imagine a number of people here > will be driving by not far from my home on their way back > from VCF. > > bill
[cctalk] Re: 5150 mobo?
IIRC, there were two main models of 5150, and a few sub-models. All 5150 were five slot. (5160 (XT) had 8 slots) There was the "16-64KB" that had one row of 4116 soldered in, and three rows of sockets. It could be purchased with those other three rows populated, at a rather high price for 4116s, or could be purchased with those three rows unpopulated. Both Apple2 and TRS80 used 4116s, so the competition had driven the prices way down. Similarly, the Tandon TM100-1 disk drive was available very cheap in the TRS80 after-market. So, the cheapest way into a 5150 was to buy a minimal system, an FDC board, and a CGA video board, and provide your own 4116s, TM100 drives, and a composite monitor. At Merritt College, we had had a PDP11, with an aftermarket drive, being used for not much more than teaching FORTRAN and COBOL. The second time that the machine was down for most of a semester, the college sold it to the Richmond School District (now "West Contra Costa"), and put a few doaen 5150s in its place. While far from comparable, there were never times when there wasn't a computer available for Fortran, COBOL, and then also BASIC. When Richmond installed the machine, something "went wrong", quite likely confusion about delta vs Y three phase power. The official (coverup) story was a "lightning strike" (at that time of year??!?), and PG paid for a replacement machine. S, everybody got what they needed. The 5150s were picky about the RAM. Some types of RAM chips would not work in it, although would work fine in Apple, or "memory tester"s. At one point, the college bought some RAM from Fry's, that did not work. But, at the Fry's store, they retested it and insisted there was nothing wrong. We escalated. Fry himself came up to Oakland to bring RAM chips that worked on our 5150s. Then, there was the "64-256KB" motherboard. It had one row of 4164s soldered in, and three rows of sockets. Populating those with 4164s gave you 256K of RAM. BUT, there was an empty socket on the board, that you could populate; I don't know whether it was a PAL or some 74xx logic, that then let you use two rows of 4164s (one row of which was soldered in) and two rows of 41256, giving 640K! 640K was all of the RAM that could be easily used, other than some upper memory space of the other video or bits in between other stuff. We sometimes referred to the two types of motherboards as "16K" and "256K" to lessen ambiguity. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred ci...@xenosoft.com
[cctalk] Re: Cleanup time again
One last shot. I have an RX Floppy disk unit. Worked fine until one time the last time I had it hooked up and after about an hour it just stopped responding. All I get now is the well known click-click on init and then nothing. I am sure it is repairable either by troubleshooting or just buying another boardset. Anybody interested? I imagine a number of people here will be driving by not far from my home on their way back from VCF. bill
[cctalk] Re: oddity or just early 5160 mobo?
Seems logical enough that someone at the time bought a 128K machine and stuffed in a bunch of ram chips they may have had laying around at the time. Memory was kind of expensive - especially new from IBM. That's totally something I would have done at the time (and probably did, but it was likely an XT for me). Joe > On Apr 10, 2024, at 9:51 PM, Just Kant via cctalk > wrote: > > I sort of doubt any of these boards were factory supplied this way, but the > date codes on the ram in question are consistent with most other ics . the > other banks contain chips that are months older, or newer. > > 64-256KB SYSTEM BOARD > > 18 TI gold capped 4164-20 chips in banks 0 and 1. > > Mix of Fujitsu, TI, NEC chips in banks 2 and 3. > > There are a half dozen numeric codes present on the board. I don't know what > any signify.
[cctalk] Re: IBM 360
> On Apr 11, 2024, at 2:42 AM, Joseph S. Barrera III via cctalk > wrote: > > On Wed, Apr 10, 2024 at 6:36 AM Murray McCullough via cctalk < > cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote: > >> I don’t think I truly realized the seminal work done at IBM then >> (60's&70's). One interesting historic tidbit is the Dutch connection on the IBM/360. One of the lead designers on the 360 was Gerrit Blaauw, a Dutch computer engineer who learned his craft at Harvard (with Aiken), and refined it at the MC in Amsterdam (now CWI) leading the design of several one-off research computers. Among other things, he taught the other designers that logic needs to be clocked to be reliable. :-) After that, he left for IBM and worked on several computer designs, culminating in the 360. Wikipedia says that the choice of 8 bit characters rather than the then-current 6 bits came from him. paul
[cctalk] Re: IBM 360
On Wed, Apr 10, 2024 at 6:36 AM Murray McCullough via cctalk < cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote: > I don’t think I truly realized the seminal work done at IBM then > (60's&70's). *Mandrake:* Well of course the answer to that is, boy, no one ever *does*.
