RE: HP 12653A line printer interface
Unfortunately, there are none of the big impact printers in the collection. In my days as an HP Customer Engineer I worked on the 2613 and 2617 drum printers and the 2611 and 2619 chain printers. I don’t recall ever working on a 2618. Those drums and chains would be covered in caked on ink and paper dust – as were my hands after working on them… The only full width data centre grade impact printers the museum has that I am currently aware of are the 2767, a 2608A and a 2563A – but there may be some more judging by some of the photos I can see in the museum’s records. From: Curious Marc [mailto:curiousma...@gmail.com] Sent: Tuesday, 18 July 2017 5:13 PM To: David Collins ; General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Cc: J. David Bryan ; Classic Computing List Subject: Re: HP 12653A line printer interface Cool. Thanks for looking. Do you guys also have some of the full 132 column ones? In particular the HP2618A or related, 1200 lpm impact chain/train technology: http://www.hpmuseum.net/display_item.php?hw=331 . I just acquired a 1200 lpm Memorex that looks like it is a rebadged Dataproducts with an IBM buss and tag interface added. I am wondering if it is based off the same mechanism/interface that was used in the HP2618A or its high end HP relatives of the time. Your web site says the HP2618A was made by Dataproducts, so that has me all intrigued. Marc From: David Collins Date: Sunday, July 16, 2017 at 4:54 PM Subject: Re: HP 12653A line printer interface I do indeed have the printer. Found it on the weekend. No sign of the interface card or cable yet though. David Collins On 14 Jul 2017, at 6:02 pm, CuriousMarc via cctalk mailto:cctalk@classiccmp.org> > wrote: Ah, thanks, I learned something. The HP 2767 is a weird beast - line drum printer but only 80 columns, from what I glean from hpmuseum.net. David (Collins), do you have the printer? Marc
Re: HP 12653A line printer interface
Cool. Thanks for looking. Do you guys also have some of the full 132 column ones? In particular the HP2618A or related, 1200 lpm impact chain/train technology: http://www.hpmuseum.net/display_item.php?hw=331 . I just acquired a 1200 lpm Memorex that looks like it is a rebadged Dataproducts with an IBM buss and tag interface added. I am wondering if it is based off the same mechanism/interface that was used in the HP2618A or its high end HP relatives of the time. Your web site says the HP2618A was made by Dataproducts, so that has me all intrigued. Marc From: David Collins Date: Sunday, July 16, 2017 at 4:54 PM Subject: Re: HP 12653A line printer interface I do indeed have the printer. Found it on the weekend. No sign of the interface card or cable yet though. David Collins On 14 Jul 2017, at 6:02 pm, CuriousMarc via cctalk wrote: Ah, thanks, I learned something. The HP 2767 is a weird beast - line drum printer but only 80 columns, from what I glean from hpmuseum.net. David (Collins), do you have the printer? Marc
Re: HP 12653A line printer interface
On 07/16/2017 04:50 PM, Paul Berger via cctalk wrote: That print technology was pretty common everywhere but at IBM for high speed line printers. When I was in college the service bureau that processed our FORTRAN had one that if I remember correctly was made by Honeywell and featured wavy print lines. The operators told us that printing graphic was very hard on this printer because if you printed a whole line of the same character every hammer fired at once, it made an awful racket and visibly shook the printer. I had a Honeywell printer like that. Actually, the even and odd characters were skewed half a letter apart, so it would print all even characters at one time, and all odds at a slightly later time. So, it only had 66 hammer driver circuits, and two power busses driven by giant SCRs. It didn't print wavy lines if the sprocket feeds were properly set for the paper size. Jon
Re: HP 12653A line printer interface
if the one I think it is... 300 lpm but if you are printing only one zone on the left side 1000 lpm if one was close to AZ I would buy it. I have great fond memories of that unit ! we had on our hp 2000. Ed# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org) In a message dated 7/16/2017 4:54:59 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, cctalk@classiccmp.org writes: I do indeed have the printer. Found it on the weekend. No sign of the interface card or cable yet though. David Collins (Sent from out of office) > On 14 Jul 2017, at 6:02 pm, CuriousMarc via cctalk wrote: > > Ah, thanks, I learned something. The HP 2767 is a weird beast - line drum > printer but only 80 columns, from what I glean from hpmuseum.net. David > (Collins), do you have the printer? > Marc > > -Original Message- > From: J. David Bryan [mailto:jdbr...@acm.org] > Sent: Tuesday, July 11, 2017 11:12 AM > To: CuriousMarc > Cc: Classic Computing List > Subject: Re: HP 12653A line printer interface > > Marc, > > >> On Monday, July 10, 2017 at 22:24, CuriousMarc wrote: >> >> I thought I did, but what I have is the HP 12845B Line Printer >> interface card, for which I could find the documentation. > > Thanks for checking. Yes, that does seem to be the more common card. As > far as I know, the 12653A was used only for the HP 2767 (a rebranded Data > Products 2310), whereas the 12845B was used for a number of other HP > printers. > > >> Reading some more, it is meant for the 2607/261x series of printers, >> which apparently use a narrower 7 bit interface (the 12566 is a 16 bit >> interface card). > > Which is all a bit odd, as the 2767 also uses 7 bits for data. Unlike the > other printers that use differential interfaces, the 2767 uses single-ended > TTL-level (more or less) drivers and receivers, which may explain the use of > the microcircuit-based interface. > > The 2767 signal drivers are adjustable for a 3- to 8-volt output level, so > perhaps the 12635A "modification" was to clip the inputs to avoid damaging > the standard microcircuit receivers (7400 TTL with an absolute maximum input > spec of 5.5 V). In the absence of a manual, I was hoping that a photograph > would reveal the modification. > > >> But maybe you can inspire yourself from it. > > The existing 2767/12653 simulation was reverse-engineered from the > diagnostic and OS drivers. Although it works, I was hoping for something > more authoritative so that the code could serve as a reference for the > now-extinct hardware. > > -- Dave > >
Re: HP 12653A line printer interface
I do indeed have the printer. Found it on the weekend. No sign of the interface card or cable yet though. David Collins (Sent from out of office) > On 14 Jul 2017, at 6:02 pm, CuriousMarc via cctalk > wrote: > > Ah, thanks, I learned something. The HP 2767 is a weird beast - line drum > printer but only 80 columns, from what I glean from hpmuseum.net. David > (Collins), do you have the printer? > Marc > > -Original Message- > From: J. David Bryan [mailto:jdbr...@acm.org] > Sent: Tuesday, July 11, 2017 11:12 AM > To: CuriousMarc > Cc: Classic Computing List > Subject: Re: HP 12653A line printer interface > > Marc, > > >> On Monday, July 10, 2017 at 22:24, CuriousMarc wrote: >> >> I thought I did, but what I have is the HP 12845B Line Printer >> interface card, for which I could find the documentation. > > Thanks for checking. Yes, that does seem to be the more common card. As > far as I know, the 12653A was used only for the HP 2767 (a rebranded Data > Products 2310), whereas the 12845B was used for a number of other HP > printers. > > >> Reading some more, it is meant for the 2607/261x series of printers, >> which apparently use a narrower 7 bit interface (the 12566 is a 16 bit >> interface card). > > Which is all a bit odd, as the 2767 also uses 7 bits for data. Unlike the > other printers that use differential interfaces, the 2767 uses single-ended > TTL-level (more or less) drivers and receivers, which may explain the use of > the microcircuit-based interface. > > The 2767 signal drivers are adjustable for a 3- to 8-volt output level, so > perhaps the 12635A "modification" was to clip the inputs to avoid damaging > the standard microcircuit receivers (7400 TTL with an absolute maximum input > spec of 5.5 V). In the absence of a manual, I was hoping that a photograph > would reveal the modification. > > >> But maybe you can inspire yourself from it. > > The existing 2767/12653 simulation was reverse-engineered from the > diagnostic and OS drivers. Although it works, I was hoping for something > more authoritative so that the code could serve as a reference for the > now-extinct hardware. > > -- Dave > >
Re: HP 12653A line printer interface
On 07/16/2017 02:50 PM, Paul Berger via cctalk wrote: > That print technology was pretty common everywhere but at IBM for > high speed line printers. When I was in college the service bureau > that processed our FORTRAN had one that if I remember correctly was > made by Honeywell and featured wavy print lines. The operators told > us that printing graphic was very hard on this printer because if you > printed a whole line of the same character every hammer fired at > once, it made an awful racket and visibly shook the printer. Yup. The CDC 501 drum printers had a switch for "high" versus "low" speed. Basically, it was a "do you want fast or readable"? IIRC, 500 LPM slow, vs. 1000 LPM fast. A little gunk in the pivot of a print hammer could render that column unreadable. Basically a machine-gun sound. The 501s that we used printed a lot of core dumps. The result was that the "0" characters wore out more quickly than others. That is, the '0' characters stared looking blurry. I recall having to go through a bunch of Univac 1108 engineering manuals printed on a very wavy drum printer. A bottle of aspirin was helpful. Train/chain printers, o the other hand, had duplicates of the more commonly printed characters, so not as bad--and the print slugs could be individually replaced if they got too bad. There, the waviness was lateral and not nearly as hard on the eyes and the vertical displacement of the drum units. --Chuck
Re: HP 12653A line printer interface
That print technology was pretty common everywhere but at IBM for high speed line printers. When I was in college the service bureau that processed our FORTRAN had one that if I remember correctly was made by Honeywell and featured wavy print lines. The operators told us that printing graphic was very hard on this printer because if you printed a whole line of the same character every hammer fired at once, it made an awful racket and visibly shook the printer. Paul. On 2017-07-14 5:02 AM, CuriousMarc via cctalk wrote: Ah, thanks, I learned something. The HP 2767 is a weird beast - line drum printer but only 80 columns, from what I glean from hpmuseum.net. David (Collins), do you have the printer? Marc -Original Message- From: J. David Bryan [mailto:jdbr...@acm.org] Sent: Tuesday, July 11, 2017 11:12 AM To: CuriousMarc Cc: Classic Computing List Subject: Re: HP 12653A line printer interface Marc, On Monday, July 10, 2017 at 22:24, CuriousMarc wrote: I thought I did, but what I have is the HP 12845B Line Printer interface card, for which I could find the documentation. Thanks for checking. Yes, that does seem to be the more common card. As far as I know, the 12653A was used only for the HP 2767 (a rebranded Data Products 2310), whereas the 12845B was used for a number of other HP printers. Reading some more, it is meant for the 2607/261x series of printers, which apparently use a narrower 7 bit interface (the 12566 is a 16 bit interface card). Which is all a bit odd, as the 2767 also uses 7 bits for data. Unlike the other printers that use differential interfaces, the 2767 uses single-ended TTL-level (more or less) drivers and receivers, which may explain the use of the microcircuit-based interface. The 2767 signal drivers are adjustable for a 3- to 8-volt output level, so perhaps the 12635A "modification" was to clip the inputs to avoid damaging the standard microcircuit receivers (7400 TTL with an absolute maximum input spec of 5.5 V). In the absence of a manual, I was hoping that a photograph would reveal the modification. But maybe you can inspire yourself from it. The existing 2767/12653 simulation was reverse-engineered from the diagnostic and OS drivers. Although it works, I was hoping for something more authoritative so that the code could serve as a reference for the now-extinct hardware. -- Dave
RE: HP 12653A line printer interface
Ah, thanks, I learned something. The HP 2767 is a weird beast - line drum printer but only 80 columns, from what I glean from hpmuseum.net. David (Collins), do you have the printer? Marc -Original Message- From: J. David Bryan [mailto:jdbr...@acm.org] Sent: Tuesday, July 11, 2017 11:12 AM To: CuriousMarc Cc: Classic Computing List Subject: Re: HP 12653A line printer interface Marc, On Monday, July 10, 2017 at 22:24, CuriousMarc wrote: > I thought I did, but what I have is the HP 12845B Line Printer > interface card, for which I could find the documentation. Thanks for checking. Yes, that does seem to be the more common card. As far as I know, the 12653A was used only for the HP 2767 (a rebranded Data Products 2310), whereas the 12845B was used for a number of other HP printers. > Reading some more, it is meant for the 2607/261x series of printers, > which apparently use a narrower 7 bit interface (the 12566 is a 16 bit > interface card). Which is all a bit odd, as the 2767 also uses 7 bits for data. Unlike the other printers that use differential interfaces, the 2767 uses single-ended TTL-level (more or less) drivers and receivers, which may explain the use of the microcircuit-based interface. The 2767 signal drivers are adjustable for a 3- to 8-volt output level, so perhaps the 12635A "modification" was to clip the inputs to avoid damaging the standard microcircuit receivers (7400 TTL with an absolute maximum input spec of 5.5 V). In the absence of a manual, I was hoping that a photograph would reveal the modification. > But maybe you can inspire yourself from it. The existing 2767/12653 simulation was reverse-engineered from the diagnostic and OS drivers. Although it works, I was hoping for something more authoritative so that the code could serve as a reference for the now-extinct hardware. -- Dave
RE: HP 12653A line printer interface
I've looked for this card in the HP Computer Museum collection - no luck so far. -Original Message- From: cctech [mailto:cctech-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of J. David Bryan via cctech Sent: Wednesday, 12 July 2017 4:12 AM To: CuriousMarc Cc: Classic Computing List Subject: Re: HP 12653A line printer interface Marc, On Monday, July 10, 2017 at 22:24, CuriousMarc wrote: > I thought I did, but what I have is the HP 12845B Line Printer > interface card, for which I could find the documentation. Thanks for checking. Yes, that does seem to be the more common card. As far as I know, the 12653A was used only for the HP 2767 (a rebranded Data Products 2310), whereas the 12845B was used for a number of other HP printers. > Reading some more, it is meant for the 2607/261x series of printers, > which apparently use a narrower 7 bit interface (the 12566 is a 16 bit > interface card). Which is all a bit odd, as the 2767 also uses 7 bits for data. Unlike the other printers that use differential interfaces, the 2767 uses single-ended TTL-level (more or less) drivers and receivers, which may explain the use of the microcircuit-based interface. The 2767 signal drivers are adjustable for a 3- to 8-volt output level, so perhaps the 12635A "modification" was to clip the inputs to avoid damaging the standard microcircuit receivers (7400 TTL with an absolute maximum input spec of 5.5 V). In the absence of a manual, I was hoping that a photograph would reveal the modification. > But maybe you can inspire yourself from it. The existing 2767/12653 simulation was reverse-engineered from the diagnostic and OS drivers. Although it works, I was hoping for something more authoritative so that the code could serve as a reference for the now-extinct hardware. -- Dave
Re: HP 12653A line printer interface
Marc, On Monday, July 10, 2017 at 22:24, CuriousMarc wrote: > I thought I did, but what I have is the HP 12845B Line Printer interface > card, for which I could find the documentation. Thanks for checking. Yes, that does seem to be the more common card. As far as I know, the 12653A was used only for the HP 2767 (a rebranded Data Products 2310), whereas the 12845B was used for a number of other HP printers. > Reading some more, it is meant for the 2607/261x series of printers, > which apparently use a narrower 7 bit interface (the 12566 is a 16 bit > interface card). Which is all a bit odd, as the 2767 also uses 7 bits for data. Unlike the other printers that use differential interfaces, the 2767 uses single-ended TTL-level (more or less) drivers and receivers, which may explain the use of the microcircuit-based interface. The 2767 signal drivers are adjustable for a 3- to 8-volt output level, so perhaps the 12635A "modification" was to clip the inputs to avoid damaging the standard microcircuit receivers (7400 TTL with an absolute maximum input spec of 5.5 V). In the absence of a manual, I was hoping that a photograph would reveal the modification. > But maybe you can inspire yourself from it. The existing 2767/12653 simulation was reverse-engineered from the diagnostic and OS drivers. Although it works, I was hoping for something more authoritative so that the code could serve as a reference for the now-extinct hardware. -- Dave
RE: HP 12653A line printer interface
I thought I did, but what I have is the HP 12845B Line Printer interface card, for which I could find the documentation. Unfortunately, looking at the schematics, it does not seem to be based on a 12566B interface. Reading some more, it is meant for the 2607/261x series of printers, which apparently use a narrower 7 bit interface (the 12566 is a 16 bit interface card). But maybe you can inspire yourself from it. Marc -Original Message- From: cctech [mailto:cctech-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of J. David Bryan via cctech Sent: Wednesday, July 05, 2017 2:36 PM To: Classic Computing List Subject: HP 12653A line printer interface Does anyone have an HP 12653A line printer interface? It is used to connect an HP 21xx/1000 CPU to an HP 2767A line printer. I am unable to find a manual for this card, but the HP "General Purpose Register Diagnostic" manual suggests that it is a modified HP 12566B Microcircuit interface. I'm trying to determine what modifications were made, so that I can model it accurately in the SIMH/HP2100 simulator. If anyone has this card and wouldn't mind sending me high-resolution photos of the front and back, I'd be most grateful. -- Dave
HP 12653A line printer interface
Does anyone have an HP 12653A line printer interface? It is used to connect an HP 21xx/1000 CPU to an HP 2767A line printer. I am unable to find a manual for this card, but the HP "General Purpose Register Diagnostic" manual suggests that it is a modified HP 12566B Microcircuit interface. I'm trying to determine what modifications were made, so that I can model it accurately in the SIMH/HP2100 simulator. If anyone has this card and wouldn't mind sending me high-resolution photos of the front and back, I'd be most grateful. -- Dave
