> I have the oportunity to aquire an IBM System 36 model 5364 with manuals
> and operating disks, all in working condition. My question is, I have never
> heard of this system (the 360/370, yes). What can I expect?
The S/36 is a minicomputer from the early 1980s (?). It replaced the
system/34, although I still had to work on one of the latter as a
student in 1985-6. I don't think I have much documentation on the S/36,
but I have some on the S/34, including an OCL (operation control
language - rather like JCL) reference which might help you.
The 5364 was a late S/36, the Desktop model. It comes in a box that
looks remarkably like a PC/AT (the only external difference being the
disk drive bays I think). Unfortunately its floppy drive is 5 1/4 inch,
where all other S/36s at that date had 8 inch.
Trivia information:
The largest S/36, together with the S/34 and a word processing system of
which I can no longer remember the number, all had the nicest floppy
drive I have ever seen. It took twenty-three disks - three singly and
two cassettes of ten each - on a moving carriage (tautology??). It
moved the carriage until the appropriate disk was opposite the hole,
then sucked it in and read/wrote it. Fast. :-)
Philip.
Uncle Roger wrote:
> (But I always was, and always will be, a Robotron man...)
What!?!?!
Do you mean the East German Robotron Elektronik, or is this another
company with the same name?
If the former, do you know what the Robotron 7022 is/was? I think it is
a micro of early '80s vintage. I have a Robotron 7622 - a large (5U
rack mount) box that appears to be the console for it (lamps and
switches and four 7-segment hex digits). I am trying to reverse
engineer but am having problems with Russian chip numbers. Sometime
soon I shall make a longer posting on this subject...
Philip.
>Sam Ismail wrote:
> One of the
>> systems he mentioned he had was a Video Brain. Apparently this is a
>> video game system. I *think* I vaguely remember hearing about this
>> system. At any rate I'm curious about it and was wondering if anybody
>> knew what it was as we both had too much tequila for him to describe and
>> for me to comprehend it.
>Video brain was made by a firm called UMTECH, used a microprocessor
>called F8 and had 1 to 4K of RAM memory. It was possible to store the
>data on cassette and, you are right there, it had many plug-in
>cartridges with games on them. It was sold mainly through departments
>stores and specialty electronic stores (at least that is what "A
>Collector's guide to personal computers" book has to say about it)
>
>enrico
>
>================================================================
>Enrico Tedeschi, 54, Easthill Drive, BRIGHTON BN41 2FD, U.K.
>tel/fax +(0)1273 701650 (24 hours) or 0850 104725 mobile
>website <http://www.ndirect.co.uk/~e.tedeschi>
>================================================================
>visit Brighton: <http://www.brighton.co.uk/tourist/welcome.htm>
>
>
>
This is a case of two computers and one name.
The Video Brain is also a desktop, CP/M microcomputer built in the early
1980's. It physically resembles an Applied Digital Data Systems ADDS 70
intelligent terminal with dual 5 1/4" floppies mounted beside the monitor.
Now you must investigate further and tell us which one it is.
Yours in good faith.
At 07:48 PM 7/11/97 -0600, you wrote:
>I think that was RS. I had one of those too. Got pretty boring pretty
>quick, cause you could fake down, go up three times and spaz on the
>forward button for a guaranteed first down every time. (or was it a
>guaranteed TD? I can't remember.)
guaranteed TD. Yep, that's it. 8^) It may have been boring, but it was
better than studying!
--------------------------------------------------------------------- O-
Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad
sinasohn(a)crl.com that none but madmen know."
Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates
San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/
Zane,
Are you trying to connect the 1702 monitor to the C128 RF port? It won't
work. The 1702 monitor should be connected to the C128 VIDEO port via a
special cable. The VIDEO port outputs composite video signal. The RF
port outputs VHS Channel 3 or 4 and is used for TV connection.
George
--
George Lin Documentum, Inc. (Nasdaq: DCTM)
Manager, Data/Voice Communi- Phone/Fax: 510-463-6800/6850
cation & End-User Computing http://www.documentum.com
Email Fax mailto:remote-printer.George_Lin@4.3.8.6.3.6.4.0.1.5.1.tpc.int
My PGP Public Key for encryption is at http://george.home.ml.org/pgp.htm
-----Original Message-----
From: Zane H. Healy [SMTP:healyzh@ix.netcom.com]
Sent: Sunday, July 13, 1997 3:11 PM
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
Subject: Some Commie questions
Hi,
I gather this rates as a classic at least :^) Been working on my Weekend
haul, and having only ever had a Vic 20 (which sadly I gave away years
ago), I'm somewhat out of my depth.
My main question is on the C= 128, along with all the other stuff I picked
up, I got a Commodore 1702 monitor, and a couple 1541 drives. I've got
the
drive attached, and the monitor hooked up via a RF cable (I guess that's
what it's called) through the front connection (This works for the Amiga
500 I also got yesterday). Anyway, I power the thing on, it "buzzes" the
drive like it's expecting to find something, and I don't get anything on
the display.
I remember that the C64's like the VIC-20 would drop you at the prompt
even
if you had nothing attached, and didn't need any kind of boot floppies.
Do
I need some kind of boot disk for this beast?
I gather a CGA monitor will work, so I guess I should dig out one of the
old Mono-CGA monitors I've got in storage.
The next question would be, is it worth trying to repair a C64's power
supply? I got two of them yesterday, both powersupplies are dead. It
looks like the 5V line is shorted to ground. I did get a copy of the Old
&
New style users manuals, and a copy of "Troubleshooting and Repairing your
Commodore 64" yesterday (I love Powells Technical Books!) so I've got some
documentation. It's been too many years since I worked as an Electrician,
so my skill level is pretty low (wasn't very high to begin with, which is
why I switched to computers).
Then there is the Amiga 500. About a month ago, I'd picked up a copy of
"Bards Tale" for the Amiga, so I know it works. Problem is I don't have a
copy of the two floppies that came with the computer originally (also got
the manual for this at Powells). I think I've got the Kickstart 1.2 ROMs
(it has a 1.2 on the screen when asking for the Workbench disk). Where
can
I get the disks? I don't suppose it's like the Apple IIgs software that
you can now download.
The second Amiga question would be, is it possible to hook up Apple IIgs,
or Macintosh 3 1/2" external floppy drive with a Amiga? I somehow doubt
it, but...
Thanks,
Zane
| Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Adminstrator |
| healyzh(a)ix.netcom.com (primary) | Linux Enthusiast |
| healyzh(a)holonet.net (alternate) | Mac Programmer |
+----------------------------------+---------------------------+
| For Empire of the Petal Throne, and Traveller Role Playing |
| see http://www.dragonfire.net/~healyzh/ |
> Does anyone remember this machine :
>
> it's a video game console (like the atari VCS) but which could sit on
> a box which then converts it to a home computer.
>
> The machine ran on a 6800 and had built-in basic.
>
> It came out approx at the same time as the Atari 400/800 series
> (78-79?)
>
> I remember seeing an ad on it and the heading of the ad was
> "imagination machine".
>
>
> Ben
>
> Ahh, the "APF Imagination Machine" I believe. Somewhere I have a
> single cartridge for it.
>
> -Mp
Hi all.
A lot of things have been significantly updated over the last few weeks.
You may want to take a look.
The web site (http://weber.u.washington.edu/~bcw/ccl.html) has been
reworked somewhat.
Brett's Classic Computer Encyclopedia
(http://www.xnet.com/~danjo/classic/index.html) has grown quite a bit
but could use some images (hint, hint, guys)
Isaac's Classic Computer Rescue site
(http://www.comland.com/~idavis/classic/classic.html) is looking good.
The Links Section of the web site has nearly doubled (although I know
you guys have more that you could cough up ;)
Same with the FAQs section (once again - send me more) and the ClassicCmp
FAQ has been HTMLized for your ease of reading.
The document archive is online (although most listings are still being
held under review).
The Big List of Classic Computers now contains sections for Prototype
and Limited-Run computers and for computers which more info is needed on.
The FTP site has been indexed and divided up into sections for various
computers - not a whole lot is there, a few faqs, articles, and pictures.
Feel free to send more ;) (ftp://140.142.225.27/pub/classiccmp)
Bill
----------------------------------------------------
Bill Whitson - Classic Computers ListOp
bill(a)booster.u.washinton.edu or bcw(a)u.washington.edu
http://weber.u.washington.edu/~bcw
> > The HP86 is basically an HP85 without the built-in monitor,tape drive,
> > or printer, but with GPIB as standard. The 9121 is a single-sided version of
> > the 9122 if that's any help.
>
> Ok, you've lost me on that one. What is the GPIB?
GPIB = General-Purpose Interface Bus. Aka IEEE-488, and very similar to
HPIB (= Hewlett-Packard Interface bus). HP were the company who designed it,
but it turns up on all sorts of machines.
It's an 8-bit parallel interface using a 24 pin connector. 8 pins are ground,
8 are data, 3 are handshake, and 5 are bus control/management. It was
originally designed to link up lab equipment (DVMs, counters, digital 'scopes,
etc), but HP use it as a general peripheral bus (disk drives, plotters,
printers, etc) on some of their micros. Commodore used it for much the same
purpose (although with looser timing requirements) on the PETs
> David Williams - Computer Packrat
-tony
> There are two flavors of HP 86, the 86A and the 86B.
Thanks for the info - I've only used 86B's.
> Re: the 9121: yep, single-sided Sony stiffy drives that hold about
> 300KB I think. It's been too long and I have forgotten just about
> everything except that the single-sided ones never seemed to hold
> quite enough (this on HP 150s).
Probalby 320 or 360K bytes (at least on the 150 - is the 9121 supported on the
150 - my manuals are silent on the subject...). It's 80 track single-sided,
and thus the same size as a double-sided 40 track disk.
> You know how 3.5" drives open the metal slider so they can get at the
> medium? The very earliest drives didn't, and the stiffies didn't
> spring-load the slider -- it was up to the user to slide the slider
> before insertion into and after removal from the drive.
I've also seen disks that open automatically, but stay open when ejected. You
'pinch' them to close them. They did not close automatically on ejection from
any drive.
> -Frank McConnell
-tony
