General Category > LisaList2
Anyone want 1/4th of a DataTower?
sigma7:
--- Quote from: compu_85 on July 04, 2022, 11:17:55 pm ---So is the "Archive Tape" driver part of Lisa OS 3.1 not for the tape drive in the Data Tower?
--- End quote ---
Sorry for my confusion; it is for the DataTower's tape, but for some reason now forgotten, I thought for a long time that the Lisa could not read/write the tape directly. Perhaps due to the examples in the DS101 manual covering only copying between a disk and tape on the same controller.
I recognize now that this is another memory failure -- I found a 2020 email exchange with Al Kossow wherein I concluded the DataTower Archive tape drive is indeed (probably) block addressable or something similar due to some document he provided.
jamesdenton:
--- Quote from: sigma7 on July 02, 2022, 07:12:29 pm ---A particularly hard to find component of the DataTower is the DS101 controller board.
This is the board that connects to the Lisa expansion card, but is not a standard part of the large Priam drives that come up for sale regularly. It has two daughterboard connectors, one is used for the tape drive interface in the DataTower, the combination is shown here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/114907644@N04/18657104320
In 2020 there was an eBay listing for 3 DS101 boards; I purchased one but received a SMART-E board (not a DS101 as was pictured in the listing). I think Al Kossow purchased one too, but I don't know what he received.
There is currently a listing for a lot of 7 "DS101" boards from the same seller (antzzworld https://www.ebay.com/usr/antzzworld).
https://www.ebay.com/itm/234604052411
There is a DS101 in most of the pictures (identifiable by the two blue socket headers where daughterboards such as the tape controller go, and which are not on any other Priam boards AFAIK). However there is a different (not a DS101) Priam board in the first picture. No suggestion of what is in the other 5 boxes; presumably also large Priam boards of some type but they could be anything as the seller is rather casual with listings.
I've tried contacting the seller to inquire as to whether the pictures show the actual items (since my experience with this seller is otherwise), but received no response. Accordingly I'm not going to gamble the substantial shipping fee to send these to me in western Canada.
Another unknown for these boards is whether they work. They have bits of string at a corner where toe-tags have been removed; given the condition of the boxes, these might have been "needs service" tags, but could have been for inventory control or anything else.
The DS101 board in the DataTower I have didn't work at first, but I was able to cobble together a repair as shown here https://www.flickr.com/photos/114907644@N04/18222211294 which was enough to get it working for testing with BLU (but still haven't worked on the tape drive). Sorry, I haven't found the posting where I explained the problem and solution. I expect to post more details, but it may have been a one-off problem that no-one else has. Hence my desire to obtain another DS101 to see if it has the same problem.
--- End quote ---
My curiosity got the better of me here.
Of the seven boards, four (4) match the description you gave for DS101 boards, while the other three (3) appear to be the SMART-E boards. Of the four DS101 boards, 3 of them were in sealed boxes (maybe resealed, but 35-year old tape).
If you're interested in one or two (or all) of the DS101s, PM me and we can work out the details. Maybe I can repurpose the 7400-series ICs on the SMART-E boards for broken CPU and I/O boards I have laying around here :D
sigma7:
--- Quote from: jamesdenton on July 12, 2022, 06:14:01 pm ---My curiosity got the better of me here.
Of the seven boards, four (4) match the description you gave for DS101 boards, while the other three (3) appear to be the SMART-E boards.
--- End quote ---
Awesome!
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[*] Previous page
Go to full version