More on DEC Pro 380

From: David C. Jenner <djenner_at_halcyon.com>
Date: Wed Jul 28 11:06:27 1999

A couple of notes:

1) Which MFM drives you can use with your Pro 380 depends on the ROMs
   on the harddrive adapter card. You need to determine that and consult
   the archives at sunsite for a blurb that details which drives go with
   which revisions of the ROMs.
2) If you don't have a daughterboard memory expansion card (NOT a memory
   expansion card on the CTI bus), you can add 512KB easily. That turns
   your Pro 380 into a 1MB machine without using a slot. I have available
   spare daughterboard memory cards that you can strip the 64Kbit chips
   from and add 256Kbit chips to get the 512KB. Let me know if you want
   one.
3) To format harddrives in general, you can use the Pro Maintenance programs
   that you normally run to check out the machine (available at ftp.update.uu.se)
   When you start the program, before typing anything, you must type a magic
   sequence of keystrokes to get the low-level formatting routine included in
   the normal menu. The magic sequence is... I forgot! I'll have to look it
   up later when I get home. Or maybe someone else can beat me to it?
4) When handling the CTI bus cards, be very careful of static and spurious
   charges. It's very easy to zap these boards for some reason. Maybe the
   PS doesn't discharge the caps?

Dave

"Zane H. Healy" wrote:
>
> Well, I got the console cable, monitor, and monitor cable tonite. I didn't
> get the keyboard (thankfully) as he'd not found one.
>
> Dug up a couple LK201's in storage, came home found a powercable (actually
> unplugged a Sparc 2 to get the power), and turned it on. Booted nice and
> smooth. Looks to be running some munged version of POS 3.2 with the VAX
> Console software on top of it.
>
> Now I've got a couple software related questions.
>
> First is there a way to get out of the VAX Console software into something
> resembleing POS? It doesn't look like it.
>
> Second. How do I get it to boot off of a floppy? Opps, never mind. I
> just booted off of my RT-11 floppy. The problem seems to be with the copy
> I made a year or so ago to use, now I'm using the original and it boots
> fine. COOL! Hmm, this might explain why I couldn't get the /73 to boot
> off of that floppy.
>
> OK, that brings up a third question. Can a Quantum 540 hard drive turned
> into a RD52 on a VAXstation 2000 be used in a DEC Pro380? Or do you need
> to do some kind of funky formating on the Pro itself. I'm thinking of
> setting up a Hard Drive with POS, and one with RT-11 when I can find the
> time.
>
> Zane
> | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Adminstrator |
> | healyzh_at_aracnet.com (primary) | Linux Enthusiast |
> | healyzh_at_holonet.net (alternate) | Classic Computer Collector |
> +----------------------------------+----------------------------+
> | Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, |
> | and Zane's Computer Museum. |
> | http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/ |
Received on Wed Jul 28 1999 - 11:06:27 BST

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