11/34 & Cool stuff, but what is it? (Q-bus gear)

From: Chuck McManis <cmcmanis_at_freegate.com>
Date: Wed Nov 3 17:33:22 1999

So I'm trying to collect the stuff I won at a recent auction, the most
unexpected deal was the PDP 11/34 for $10 with the DEC Cassette tape
transport. Its dirty and grimy but it seems complete. I could satisfy my
desire for a Unibus -11 for now (and at a cost I appreciate :-)

Anyone have any info on the DEC Cassettes? TU-?? they are standard audio
format cassettes and one of the cassetes that came with it claims to have
PAL, EDIT, and LINK on it. This will be fun to explore.

Then I bid on a rack of "junk" which was topped off by a Kennedy 9610 tape
drive. I bid on it because the tape drive had what appearred to be a 50 pin
cable going to a Q-bus card marked Emulex. In fact it was _two_ 50 pin
cables and the Emulex card is labelled QT1310401-00-REV E. On the firmware
the label reads QT1310201-02 REV K. What is it? A search of the web turned
up zilch. I was hoping it was a SCSI controller but two connectors? (one is
terminated with resistor packs) On board is the obligatory processor and
some switches.
Anyone know how to configure this? (If nothing else it gives me 9-track
capability.

Another "jewel" on the rack was a Dilog Q696-20 dual ESDI controller. I'm
going to try swapping the RQllD for this one and see if I can get NetBSD to
run stably. The MSCP implementation in the RQ has a bug that NetBSD tickles
so it makes it hard to debug things.

Then what clearly _was_ a SCSI controller was a board from Alphatronix.
This thing was connected to a dual cartridge disk unit. It looks from the
front like CD-ROM drives with CDs in carriers but until I choose to risk
power to it I can't get the media out to inspect it. The box is called an
"inspire"?
Anyway, the model number is Q/9142 or Q1.50, _any_ help here would be
greatly appreciated.

Then the other interesting card was a national instruments 179055-01 which
has an Intel 8291? on board (date code of either '84 or '91). Sort of a
weird 40 pin connector that goes to what looks like the old GPIB connectors.

Final question, how do you "de-rack" the 11/34? I can get it to rotate but
I can't get it to let go and come out of the rack. I don't want to
transport it in the rack so...

Its like christmas,
--Chuck
Received on Wed Nov 03 1999 - 17:33:22 GMT