DG 800/1200 questions

[Henk Gooijen]

>> >>2) I have quite a number (maybe around six or seven) of rackmount
>> >> dual cassette tape units for these machines. I seem to recall that
>> >> they use cassette tapes that are not identical to the standard
>> >> common audio cassettes available today. Is anyone aware of where
>> >> these special tapes can be purchased new?
>>
>> If they are identical to the ones I'm thinking of, they have a notch
>> at the back. This notch of off-center. It enables you to test whether
>> your are accessing side A or side B.
>> I've used them extensively in Philips equipment, but they were also
>> used by Facit and others.
>> The capacity is 250k bytes per side, and the format is called ECMA34
>
> While EGMA34 was a very common format for such cassettes, it was not the
> only one (AFAIK). I am sure I have sene at least one tape drive that uses
> such cassetes and uses at totally different format. The notch may well be
> used to ensure the cassette can only be fitted one way round with soem
> formats -- which use the entire width of the tape in one go.
>
> But alas I have no idea where you'd get the casssettes now.
>
> -tony

I am not sure, but is it possible that the DIGITAL TU60 DECassette
uses the same type of tape? I have a picture of such a tape on my
site (www.pdp-11.nl/peripherals/tape/tu60-info.html).
I have just a few of them (IIRC, I'd have to check on that).
If those tapes can be used on DG, I might make one or two available
for you Jay.

- Henk.