I've been looking for a cheap laptop with a decent display that I can
put a dual serial PCMCIA card and a network interface into.
/dev/tty1 - 11/750 console
/dev/tty2 - TU58 emulator to 11/750
/dev/tty3 - 11/750 emulator <grin> to TU58
That way I can read/write/load TU58s, back them up to/from the network,
and also have a console terminal. By running FreeBSD (or equiv), I can
have PDF files etc available for reference if required.
My final goal is to design and build a SMD drive emulator that plugs
into the PCI bus, and serve disks to the 11/750 (and 11/780) from
files on the local hard drive of a full blown PC. The power draw
of a modern PC is a LOT less than a single 14" Fujitsu drive, and
the disks are more reliable...
Clint
On Wed, 16 Jan 2002, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>
> --- Doc <doc_at_mdrconsult.com> wrote:
> > On Wed, 16 Jan 2002, Ethan Dicks wrote:
> > >
> > > The reason for using the other VAX is to use it to easily create the
> > > filesystem on the emulated tape. If you had a way to read the tape
> > > that you do have, you could just put the image on the PC, run the
> > > TU-58 emulator and go.
> >
> > OK, the reason I haven't joined this thread before is that I'm almost
> > entirely ignorant wrt console tapes. Plus, up to this point an emulated
> > TU-58 wouldn't get data off the orphan tapes, so an emulator wouldn't
> > help much.
>
> Not if you were starting from absolute scratch. One idea I had was that
> if you had another VAX, one that has the binary files that the console
> tape needs (the text files can be fairly easily created - they are less
> than a page of text each), there might be a way to squirt the files into
> the TU-58 emulator that could be pulled back out by the target 11/730.
>
> > My question is, why go the small-PC route instead of using something
> > like the TU-58 emulator at
> > http://www.sparetimegizmos.com/Hardware/TU58_Emulator.htm ?
> >
> > It is really a question, not a suggestion. I think I'm missing a
> > point somewhere....
>
> The point, at least for me, is that, while the hardware emulator is
> cool, the software/PC emulator is cheaper by loads - more power draw,
> but it doesn't have to be on full-time. Personally, I would probably
> throw a 16Mb box w/multiple serial ports and an ethernet port, all
> Linux-friendly. That way, I could log in remotely from another point
> on my network, and play with the files used by the emulator. DOS would
> not allow that. Hey... you could even throw up Apache and put the
> emulator data files in a place that could be inspected by a cgi-script
> for "web-u-lation". :-)
>
> I think the hardware-based TU-58 emulator is really cool, but I'm more
> likely to throw together something in a $10 PeeCee-oid box.
>
> -ethan
>
>
>
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Received on Thu Jan 17 2002 - 18:32:00 GMT