Hi,
I was wondering if anyone might know where I can get the artwork on the
front panel restored for my Altair 680. This was an original computer my
late brother bought as a kit back in the 70's. I helped him build this
and we sure had some fun programming this. I'm finally getting around to
restore this. I dug it out from the last trip visiting them. All my
stuff was stored in their garage since we moved.. The logo silkscreen
has faded away. I was hoping there is some way to restore this, either
by replacing the front panel or getting this repainted(or silkscreened).
In the meantime, I can get the hardware cleaned up and hopefully get
this to run again.
thanks,
=Dan
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
[My Corner of Cyberspace http://ragooman.home.comcast.net/]
[Pittsburgh Robotics Society http://www.pghrobotics.org/]
[Pittsburgh Vintage Comp.Society http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pghvintagecomp/]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
Version: 7.0.344 / Virus Database: 267.10.15/81 - Release Date: 8/24/2005
Hi all,
Does anybody out there know for certain when the
term BIOS was coined? I believe it was Gary Kildall,
and from what I can find, it was around 1978 that
he abstracted the I/O and localized it in what
he called the BIOS. Anyone know differently?
Also -- was the BIOS stored on the CP/M
floppy, or was it in ROM/EPROM? If not, how
did CP/M machines boot? Was there a dedicated
boot ROM that was used just for startup, and
then the BIOS took over? I had one back in
the day, but I sure can't remember this detail.
This is for a writing project, so I'd like
to get it right,
Thanks!
Brian
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
_| _| _| Brian Knittel
_| _| _| Quarterbyte Systems, Inc.
_| _| _| Tel: 1-510-559-7930
_| _| _| Fax: 1-510-525-6889
_| _| _| Email: brian at quarterbyte.com
_| _| _| http://www.quarterbyte.com
>
>Subject: Re: Bit of CP/M trivia needed
> From: Steve Thatcher <melamy at earthlink.net>
> Date: Sat, 27 Aug 2005 18:13:27 -0400
> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>
>what machine and/or controller was this that had no ROM at all? I
>never have dealt with any system that at least didn't have some type
>of startup code somewhere other than a disk drive. DMA would need to
>be setup unless it was hardwired. The original Intel Intellec-8
>required that you enter a program jump into memory that pointed to
>the program monitor. Intel didn't call it a BIOS though.
>
>
>>Hi
>> My understanding was that the first ones had no ROM
>>and used a DMA controller that loaded bootstrapping
>>code from the first sector on reset. I have such a
>>controller on my machine. All RAM, no ROMs.
>>Dwight
There were a few later machines that used shadow boot rom
(it was a doide matrix) and one I know of that the hardware
dma was programmed to grab the first sector at reset but
the dma logic dwarfed the CPU. There was a slightly later
machine that could also do that but, the real trick was the
FDC was a second cpu with rom and it know that if it saw
reset it was to find the boot block and copy it to ram
@0000h so the main cpu ran on release from DMA hold and reset.
However early machines were ot so extravagant with hardware
as it was mostly SSI TTL and to do dma it nearly doubled
the total system package count (without counting ram). An
8080 system needed a lot of support components.
In the end it's irrelevent to the basic question asked.
The CPM system from at least V1.3 on generally depended
on some kind of program (however small) to boot the first
block or blocks the usual mode was to load the CP/M image
as a monolithic chunk of code and then execute it. In most
cases the amountof code needed to do that would fit in the
then available 256byte EProms/fuse roms ( either 1702 or bipolar).
Allison
I'm a fairly young collector of old computers in general, though it's
mostly home computers since they're the easiest to get a hold of. I
have a TRS-80 Model III, and in order to fix the keyboard, I had to
remove the case. This accidentally pulled off a test probe that was
clipped to a pin on a chip in the computer. The probe was from an add
on video card called "The Graphyx Solution"
Here is a picture of some of the probes:
http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/9986/graphyxsln3mt.jpg
A white probe is unattached, and every other time the computer was
turned on until I realized what happened, the screen was full of
garbage. Does anyone have installation instructions for this card?
"Joe R." <rigdonj at cfl.rr.com> wrote:
> I wonder if they used the "combining stand" to put them together?
> That's what they did with the (I think) 9830 and 9866 printer. I actually
> found one of the "combining stands". It's just a C-shapped metal frame like
> a printer stand except that it fits over the calculator and hold the
> printer. It's nothing real special but it is an interesting accessory.
Here is a picture of the stand allowing an HP9866A printer to be
placed over an HP9825A.
http://www.series80.org/Misc/HP9825+9866printer.jpg
I haven't actually seen one close up, and for some reason I assumed
it was made from some sort of plastic (like the cases of the HP-85)
but in retrospect it was probably easier (from a tooling perspective)
to use a metal stand.
**vp
Anyone interested to swap these cards :
- 13037 INTF, 13037-80023
- Time Base Gen., 12539-60003
- BACI 12966 A, 12966-60001
- BACI 12966 A, 12966-60002 (the last 2 is hand written on the card)
- 7970 MAG TAPE 1, 13183-60012
- 7970 MAG TAPE 2, 13183-60013
- BUS I/O, 59310-60101
- Line Printer Interface, 12845-60005
- 8 Chan Mux, 663006
- Jumper, 02116-6110
I only know these cards come from a HP 21MX E-Series, they are untested.
If you're interested in buying these or swapping them let me know
what you have/would like to offer. Dont ask me what I have in mind
for an offer, just make me an offer and we'll continue from there.
Stefan.
-------------------------------------------------------
http://www.oldcomputercollection.com
>
>Subject: Re: Anyone got a plain ASCII Windows font?
> From: Scott Stevens <chenmel at earthlink.net>
> Date: Sun, 28 Aug 2005 13:37:23 -0500
> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>
>On Sun, 28 Aug 2005 11:37:08 -0400
>Allison <ajp166 at bellatlantic.net> wrote:
>
>> >
>> >Subject: RE: Anyone got a plain ASCII Windows font?
>> > From: "Richard A. Cini" <rcini at optonline.net>
>> > Date: Sun, 28 Aug 2005 11:35:56 -0400
>> > To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'"
>> > <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>> >
>> >Hey, it was done with a smily-face, so it's OK.
>> >
>> >Personally, I prefer Procomm for my DOS needs and either Hyterterm or
>> >Tera Term for Windows needs.
>>
>> I prefer procom when I have to use a PC. When I don't have to use a
>> PC a real VT100, VT320, VT340 or even a H19 tend to be very handy.
>> However,
>> in the room here The VT320 or VT340 are allways at easy reach. I
>> find the
>> "REAL(tm) TERMINAL" allways beats the PC imitation.
>>
>> Allison
>
>I guess I only raised it as an issue because in 'modern times' I have
>found the terminal emulation features of Tera Term to be far superior to
>anything else. If you want to connect to a Linux or BSD box from a
>Windows terminal and run modern curses-based applications like Midnight
>Commander, Tera Term is great (in TTY or in Telnet or SSH modes).
Still use the copy of procom freeware from back '91ish, it's was the best
I'd seen for free and I find it works well. It was '91 that I finally broke
down and added a PCxt clone (leading edge model D) to the stable.
>Back in the BBS days with a modem, I discovered Telemate and never
>looked back at Procomm, although Procomm 2.4.2 was an excellent term for
>it's time. Procomm Plus sorta borrowed on 2.4.2's rep and I thought
>never delivered much more. And it wasn't shareware, to boot. (it was
>Bossware, the kind of software box you'd find on the shelf of 'the
>suits.')
;) Back in the BBS days I use either a PDP-11/RT-11 with TERM or
the CP/M crate with TERMITE. TERMITE was a homebrew package that did
terminal passthrough as the system had a real terminal and could also
do Xmodem transfers. IT's big feature and whay it wasn't portable
is the modem input buffer and the console input buffers were interrupt
driven large buffers so you could even type commands for the remote
system while recieving stuff at 1200 baud.
Allison
>
>Subject: RE: Anyone got a plain ASCII Windows font?
> From: "Richard A. Cini" <rcini at optonline.net>
> Date: Sun, 28 Aug 2005 11:35:56 -0400
> To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>
>Hey, it was done with a smily-face, so it's OK.
>
>Personally, I prefer Procomm for my DOS needs and either Hyterterm or Tera
>Term for Windows needs.
I prefer procom when I have to use a PC. When I don't have to use a PC
a real VT100, VT320, VT340 or even a H19 tend to be very handy. However,
in the room here The VT320 or VT340 are allways at easy reach. I find the
"REAL(tm) TERMINAL" allways beats the PC imitation.
Allison
Lately, a bunch of my cctalk messages got into my spam folder.
That never used to happen, and I didn't make any changes locally.
Anyone have some insight? Jay?
-----------------------------------------
Evan Koblentz's personal homepage: http://www.snarc.net
Also see: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/midatlanticretro/
Where did PDAs come from? http://www.snarc.net/pda/pda-treatise.htm
*** Tell your friends about the (free!) Computer Collector Newsletter
- 770 readers and no spam / Publishes every Monday / Write for us!
- Mainframes to videogames, hardware and software, we cover it all
- W: http://news.computercollector.com E: news at computercollector.com
Continuing with my own experience as I use it, and feedback from
others, I have once again updated ImageDisk.
1.05 = Fix to interleave logic (could mix up Cylinder/Head mapping).
Rename IMDAM to IMDU (IMageDisk Utility) and add capabilities:
- Handle larger tracks
- Remove specific tracks/sides
- Convert image to raw binary sector dump
- Translate data rates within image
- reGenerate tracks with new interleave factor
- Append, Replace and Extract comment record
The update is available on my site (see sig), in the "Disks/Software
imaegs" section - imd105.zip near the top of that page.
Dave
--
dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield
dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com
com Vintage computing equipment collector.
http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html
