Hi Mike,

>> Would you be interested in using them for your sites?

Wouldnt mind one just to scan and check but the primary
server now is very low powered and just IDE now.

The secondary server is mostly off except for the weekend
mirroring run.

>I didn't mention - they also have a *DALLAS* (sealed) SRAM module on them.

I sort of assumed it would have, a lot of these are now flat as its
a battery + CMOS BIOS settings chip as well, main reason a lot
of them are being thrown out as most people dont seem to realise the
Dallas chip is what holds the settings, and RAID parameters.

The SRAM is used for storing data in case of powerfailure, and/or
parity information so the write can be completed when the
system comes up again.

Good idea in its day but much prefer the easier to replace button
cell's to using a knife to cut open the dallas chip and soldering
leads to the terminals onto an external battery.

>I have a Japanese i8086 (non-IBM-compatible) PC, a Panafacom [you can 
>guess which companies made up that consortium] Duet-16, which took a 
>Motorola 68000 in an expansion box [the one that could also hold 4 HDDs, 
>as there were only 2 * 720KB 5.25" drives built-in to the 
>double-metal-shielded system unit], and one could toggle a DIP-switch to 
>boot either 8086 or 68000, or toggle another to start in the built-in 
>hardware debugger, with included disassembler in hardware - and that 
>had/still has a DALLAS clock component that looks very similar to the 
>SRAM module, and although I bought that system in 1983 - in 1999 after 
>not being switched up for 6 years or so, the RTC was about 4 seconds out!

Very lucky :-) you must have stored it somewere cool and with low
humitity, so now you'll tell me it was near the hot water heater :o)

>Now that's reliability. I haven't checked it lately - it's out in the 
>10' x 8' x 6'+ garden shed these days in 'storage', but I'll check it 
>out again in the next year abd see if it's still running.

I would be very surprised but stranger things have happened.

My 1982 DEC Rainbow 100B+ still boots with its 5Mb HD, dual
boot, MSDOS and CPM. This one has a modified BIOS as I
replaced the 8088 with a V20 chip, also uses a Z80 for I/O in
DOS, or it uses the V20 chip for I/O when CPM is booted
to the Z80. Both my DEC color monitors still work as well,
though the plastic on the keyboards is starting to crumble :-(

Miss my old DEC PRO380 though, lost that back in 1997.

Cheers
Ian Manners
http://www.os2site.com/


Watch this space.                Now blink.   Now go to next message.


 
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