Tony,
an all-in-one email...
> OK, in the production XXX, the hard and floppy drives were connected to
> an OMTI board, and thence to the SCSI bus. Your unit is consistent with this
Yep, that's exactly what I have. The case may or may not be a stock part. The
XXX case itself looks to be from something else for sure though - there are
even two spare half-height drive bays inside.
The XXX I have is a single board called a 'Stickleback' with various connectors
in it - including BT in/out and an Ethernet port (none of these are actually
wired to the back of the case though). There's also markings on the board for a
VME bus connection, but no socket or associated circuitry.
I'm "missing" two ICs: IC139 is just a socket for a 48 pin IC beneath which is
written "WYN8526(ET)". IC140 next to this is a 24 pin socket and is also empty.
Maybe something to do with the ethernet circuitry? The connector's nearby. (ET
= 'Ethernet Transciever" ?? :)
> The production machines have a 8 pin DIN for video.
OK, I do have that but it's labelled RGB; there's also the hole for a socket
labelled 'video' - but as the case is a hack who knows...
> Be careful. This sounds like the case from something else. Production
> XXXs have 2 DB25 sockets, and both are RS232 ports (one actually carries
> 2 sets of RS232 signals, for a total of 3 serial ports). There is no
> parallel port on the production machines....
My Stickleback board is marked as having RS432 and X.25, both on 25 pin ports.
The RS432 port is wired through to the parallel port on the back of the case,
and the X.25 port is wired through to the RS432 port on the back of the case
:-)
> Production machines don't have a conventional power switch. The PSU is
> controlled by a relay. There's a touch-sensitive contact on the front of
> the box that turns the PSU on when touched.
Except on mine :-) There's a battery hanging loose inside the case, but
nothing resembling touch contacts; it appears that's all been bypassed on this
machine and the power switch works conventionally. I wonder what the correct
procedure of shutting it down safely is... (hopefully one of the various stock
Unix methods will work)
[Torch "Hard Disc"]
> This sounds a bit BBC-micro like!. There is a Torch SCSI hard disk unit
> for the beeb -- it's supposed to be rather rare. The one I've seen is a
> plinth to fit under the nonitor contianing the SCSI interface (connectes
> to the Beeb 1MHz bus) + hard disk and also a floppy drive (connects to the
> normal Beeb disk controller). Maybe you have much the same unit built
> into a case with the Beeb mainboard and monitor.
OK, been inside now - it is a BBC, with a Torch Z80 coprocessor. Torch SASI
interface hooked up to the BBC's 1MHz bus, with a Xebec interface hanging off
that which talks to the hard drive. Integral display is a Microvitec (probably
a Cub). The case appears to be production quality but is a very oddball design
(as is the seperate PSU). See seperate post for link to pics if you can
motivate yourself to look at some grahpics :-}
The keyboard's an ineresting custom design with about a million keys :-) Half
of these seem to be labelled with various wordprocessing functions. I since
believe I'm missing a modem from it, but one of the spares I have will fit -
not sure where it hooks up to the rest of the system though.
[ Torch-725 ]
> The QuadX I have is in the same case (basically) as a production XXX. But
> the mainboard is a singla 6U VME card, and there's a little 3 slot (I
> think) VME cardcage in the bottom slice. Much the same PSU as
Hmmm... ok, what I have in that 725 is another BBC, a 68k Torch Atlas board,
Torch SCSI interface, and a Xebec controller talking to the full-height drive.
I need to go poke around in the documentation sometime. And I'll have to hassle
the guy I got these from about the rack-mount QX he has if this is in fact
something different :)
Information on what exactly a Torch Unicorn was would be useful, to be honest.
Some people seem to think it was the name of a complete machine, whilst others
think it was just the name for the range of Torch cards available for the BBC.
Just idly wondering if the 725 was a prototype Unicorn or something; I don't
have details of exactly what machines Torch made.
> This does not sound like a XXXX....
I do have a spare hard disk labelled as Quad X, those tape drives and
controller boards, a surplus Torch-stock PSU, complete ROM set, and the
complete schematics for the QX VME card. I'll just go build myself one... ;-)
>> Triple X PSU (or so I was told; not having a 'genuine' Triple X I don't
>> know!)
>
> Can you describe it? I've got a couple of XXXs (including a nicely
> expanded one with a Quinring on top), and quite a pile of spares...
Duh! I just picked it up; I'd only noticed the Farnell label before. It
actually says "Triple X 100W" on the side :) It's not the same as the power
supply in my "prototype" XXX which is a 150W unit, same as the one in the big
"Hard Disc" machine.
> In theory the XXX can support a tape drive on the SCSI bus, but I've
> never managed to get it to work...
I'll keep an eye out when I go through the docs I have. I noticed on the
previous owner's invoices for the XXX that I now have that he recieved it with
a tape drive. Maybe there'll be some info amongst everything that says how it
hooks up. The two tape drives I got were from XXX machines so I can grab model
numbers / interface details from those too.
>> Seven issue 3 Torch manta boards,
> These are used in XXX and XXXX machines if you have a real SCSI hard
> drive (as opposed to an ST506 one on an OMTI board).
gotcha. I can't imagine I can make use of seven of them, unless driving them is
easy enough that I can use them in other systems... I've got the docs for the
boards but I don't know how detailed they are yet.
>> Two Torch key disks (with different serial numbers).
> You may not have realised it yet, but the Torch OS is keyed to the serial
> number of the (uncopyable) Key disk. If you have to re-install the OS, or
> if the NiCd goes flat, or... you need the right key disk...
uh-oh :-)
I have two, for machines with two different serial numbers. Hopefully one works
with the 'prototype' system I have (or, if it is a prototype, they disabled
this feature :-)
cheers
Jules
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Received on Fri Jun 27 2003 - 07:13:00 BST