I am now the proud owner of a living breathing HP2000Access system. Today I got the IOP configured and running, then the system processor followed suit in short order. I was quite concerned that after spending years on getting the hardware all tested and passing diagnostics that I'd go to load the OS and the OS tape would be bad. Fortunately, that was not the case, the OS tape read and installed just beautifully! I was able to do system console commands like ROS, DIR, SLE, HIB, CRE, etc. Was even able to do ANN-ALL,System going down now! before shutting it down.
The biggest wrinkle I ran into at the last minute was loading the cross-link and mag tape boot loader from the IOP to the system processor. The documentation was slightly obtuse about this, and I just couldn't get it to work. Finally I just said "heck with the cross-link" and moved the paper tape reader to the system processor and did it there. That means I can't share the paper tape reader to users on the system, something I really need to do so I can easily duplicate tapes and read them under BASIC. The way I was trying to load that tape was strange anyway, because I don't have the "loader/loader" tape. If anyone has a copy of the "loader/loader" tape, I would GREATLY appreciate a copy so I can install and configure the system the way you're supposed to instead of the kludge that I did.
I did not hook up a terminal to the system other than the system console, I need to do many hours of soldering to rebuild the mux panel that I have. But since the MESS and ANN commands work, it's pretty likely the mux boards are in fact fine. I just may take tomorrow off work to build the mux panel and hook up a terminal other than the console.
The only thing left to do on the system is rerack everything. The components aren't in my better racks, and some are not quite mounted properly, etc. So, basically cosmetic stuff.
One thing I need to ask the list for (besides a copy of the loader/loader mentioned above) - an initial system load of TSB doesn't have any system library. I seem to recall one or more list members telling me they had HIB tapes of system libraries (hopefully including things like startrk, wumpus, hanoi, etc.). Now that the system is up and running, I would love to borrow any and all HIB tapes I can get to build a nice system library. If I get multiple tapes from multiple people, I'd be happy to send a tape back that includes the entire library from everyone. I'll probably key in all the programs from the David Ahl computer games book too.
Finally - I suspect others on the list might be trying to build HP2000 TSB systems too - now that mine is running, after the dust settles I will most likely have duplicates of things that I have amassed - software, hardware, etc. I will gladly offer the excess/duplicates of stuff to listmembers. Preference will be given to people who are fairly close to a running system, so that we can get as many of these machines up as possible.
Regards,
Jay West
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Received on Fri Aug 31 2001 - 05:24:18 BST