Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first? I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages? Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to do of it too. Bill
I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.” From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have. -- Jameel Akari
On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages?
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to do of it too.
Bill
I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice. On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.”
From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages?
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to do of it too.
Bill
I was thinking the same - NLQ might be good enough, assuming the thing still works at all. An OfficeMax store-closing liquidation fated me a full case of greenbar. -- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:19 AM, Dean Notarnicola <dnotarnicola@gmail.com> wrote:
I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.”
From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages?
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to do of it too.
Bill
They want a printout only? Not a printer too, right? Bill On Sat, Feb 27, 2021, 9:34 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I was thinking the same - NLQ might be good enough, assuming the thing still works at all. An OfficeMax store-closing liquidation fated me a full case of greenbar.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:19 AM, Dean Notarnicola <dnotarnicola@gmail.com> wrote:
I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.”
From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages?
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to do of it too.
Bill
Anyone want to talk on discord about this? Who is actually doing it? I'm at InfoAge and we have greenbar, if needed I'll find a widecarrige printer and see if I can get it to print from a PC. Let me know if you are actually doing the print-out. -andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:45 AM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
They want a printout only? Not a printer too, right? Bill
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021, 9:34 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I was thinking the same - NLQ might be good enough, assuming the thing still works at all. An OfficeMax store-closing liquidation fated me a full case of greenbar.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:19 AM, Dean Notarnicola <dnotarnicola@gmail.com> wrote:
I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.”
From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages?
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to do of it too.
Bill
On Feb 27, 2021, at 12:09 PM, Andrew Diller <dillera@gmail.com> wrote:
Anyone want to talk on discord about this? Who is actually doing it?
Send me an invite to the appropriate Discord, I don’t seem to have it anymore. (Maybe I left because it was idle?) I will go test my Proprinter and see if it works. It’s been a long time since I’ve tried, and I know I have a second non-working one so hopefully I haven’t confused the two.
I'm at InfoAge and we have greenbar, if needed I'll find a widecarrige printer and see if I can get it to print from a PC
Serial into a DECwriter if you can’t find a printer with a Centronics port. Oh, and a ribbon that isn’t fossilized. :/
.
Let me know if you are actually doing the print-out.
If my printer self-tests ok and I have a ribbon, I’ll fire up my test mule Linux PC that has a parallel port and give it a shot. — Jameel
-andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:45 AM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
They want a printout only? Not a printer too, right? Bill
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021, 9:34 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I was thinking the same - NLQ might be good enough, assuming the thing still works at all. An OfficeMax store-closing liquidation fated me a full case of greenbar.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:19 AM, Dean Notarnicola <dnotarnicola@gmail.com> wrote:
I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.”
From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages?
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to do of it too.
Bill
Most of the printers at VCF are daisy wheel. So far none of the dot matrix work. I don’t think we can print from VCF. — Andrew Diller 267-353-2203
On Feb 27, 2021, at 1:42 PM, Jameel Akari <jakari@bithose.com> wrote:
On Feb 27, 2021, at 12:09 PM, Andrew Diller <dillera@gmail.com> wrote:
Anyone want to talk on discord about this? Who is actually doing it?
Send me an invite to the appropriate Discord, I don’t seem to have it anymore. (Maybe I left because it was idle?)
I will go test my Proprinter and see if it works. It’s been a long time since I’ve tried, and I know I have a second non-working one so hopefully I haven’t confused the two.
I'm at InfoAge and we have greenbar, if needed I'll find a widecarrige printer and see if I can get it to print from a PC
Serial into a DECwriter if you can’t find a printer with a Centronics port. Oh, and a ribbon that isn’t fossilized. :/
.
Let me know if you are actually doing the print-out.
If my printer self-tests ok and I have a ribbon, I’ll fire up my test mule Linux PC that has a parallel port and give it a shot.
— Jameel
-andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:45 AM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
They want a printout only? Not a printer too, right? Bill
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021, 9:34 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I was thinking the same - NLQ might be good enough, assuming the thing still works at all. An OfficeMax store-closing liquidation fated me a full case of greenbar.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:19 AM, Dean Notarnicola <dnotarnicola@gmail.com> wrote:
I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.”
> From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have.
-- Jameel Akari
> On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: > > Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? > Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a > print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first? > > I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages? > > Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that > might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer > there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc > running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least > try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the > warehouse > > When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to > do of it too. > > Bill
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 1:55 PM Andrew Diller via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Most of the printers at VCF are daisy wheel. So far none of the dot matrix work.
I don’t think we can print from VCF.
That's what I thought. If we had a few weeks, then we could have someone at the next repair workshop repair one of the printers, but we only have a few days.
— Andrew Diller 267-353-2203
On Feb 27, 2021, at 1:42 PM, Jameel Akari <jakari@bithose.com> wrote:
On Feb 27, 2021, at 12:09 PM, Andrew Diller <dillera@gmail.com> wrote:
Anyone want to talk on discord about this? Who is actually doing it?
Send me an invite to the appropriate Discord, I don’t seem to have it anymore. (Maybe I left because it was idle?)
I will go test my Proprinter and see if it works. It’s been a long time since I’ve tried, and I know I have a second non-working one so hopefully I haven’t confused the two.
I'm at InfoAge and we have greenbar, if needed I'll find a widecarrige
printer and see if I can get it to print from a PC
Serial into a DECwriter if you can’t find a printer with a Centronics port. Oh, and a ribbon that isn’t fossilized. :/
.
Let me know if you are actually doing the print-out.
If my printer self-tests ok and I have a ribbon, I’ll fire up my test mule Linux PC that has a parallel port and give it a shot.
— Jameel
-andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:45 AM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
They want a printout only? Not a printer too, right? Bill
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021, 9:34 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I was thinking the same - NLQ might be good enough, assuming the thing still works at all. An OfficeMax store-closing liquidation fated me a full case of greenbar.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:19 AM, Dean Notarnicola < dnotarnicola@gmail.com> wrote:
I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice.
> On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: > > I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.” > >> From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have. > > -- > Jameel Akari > >> On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: >> >> Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? >> Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a >> print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first? >> >> I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages? >> >> Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that >> might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer >> there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc >> running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least >> try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the >> warehouse >> >> When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to >> do of it too. >> >> Bill >
OK. An update Andy looked at the printers that we have. A DEC Writer III seemed the best candidate, but it needs repair beyond our ability to fix. So it is a bust at VCF museum. On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 1:55 PM Andrew Diller via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Most of the printers at VCF are daisy wheel. So far none of the dot matrix work.
I don’t think we can print from VCF.
— Andrew Diller 267-353-2203
On Feb 27, 2021, at 1:42 PM, Jameel Akari <jakari@bithose.com> wrote:
On Feb 27, 2021, at 12:09 PM, Andrew Diller <dillera@gmail.com> wrote:
Anyone want to talk on discord about this? Who is actually doing it?
Send me an invite to the appropriate Discord, I don’t seem to have it anymore. (Maybe I left because it was idle?)
I will go test my Proprinter and see if it works. It’s been a long time since I’ve tried, and I know I have a second non-working one so hopefully I haven’t confused the two.
I'm at InfoAge and we have greenbar, if needed I'll find a widecarrige
printer and see if I can get it to print from a PC
Serial into a DECwriter if you can’t find a printer with a Centronics port. Oh, and a ribbon that isn’t fossilized. :/
.
Let me know if you are actually doing the print-out.
If my printer self-tests ok and I have a ribbon, I’ll fire up my test mule Linux PC that has a parallel port and give it a shot.
— Jameel
-andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:45 AM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
They want a printout only? Not a printer too, right? Bill
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021, 9:34 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I was thinking the same - NLQ might be good enough, assuming the thing still works at all. An OfficeMax store-closing liquidation fated me a full case of greenbar.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:19 AM, Dean Notarnicola < dnotarnicola@gmail.com> wrote:
I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice.
> On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: > > I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.” > >> From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have. > > -- > Jameel Akari > >> On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: >> >> Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? >> Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a >> print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first? >> >> I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages? >> >> Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that >> might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer >> there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc >> running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least >> try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the >> warehouse >> >> When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to >> do of it too. >> >> Bill >
-- Jeff Brace ========================================= Vice President & Board Member Vintage Computer Festival East Show-runner Vintage Computer Federation is a 501c3 charity http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org cell: 732-759-1783
Some more info on the VCF printers. 1. Nice Epson Wide carriage- powers on, but errors immediately and won't print a test page. 2. Diablo 630 - really cool looking printer, clean and powers but goes to alert, print head won't move. Also a daisywheel. 4. Okidata wide carriage- this powers and the test print actually starts but it prints one line and then goes into error condition 5. Decwriter III - this powers up, prints but the take-up spool for the ribbon doesn't work - the ribbon becomes more and more slack. 6.. Decwriter III - this powers up but has an error that won't clear, won't go into local mode. We really should get the Decwriter and the Diablo working. I'll take a look at them again with some help next week at the Repair day. We also need to setup a dos system luggable we can use for jobs like this, a Compaq luggable would be perfect with a network card in it to do ftp on the network. I'll ask for some help next weekend to see if any of the seven I saw in the warehouse can be made functional for this job. The next time we get a request like this, we should be prepared. -andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 4:10 PM, Jeffrey Brace <jeffrey@vcfed.org> wrote:
OK. An update Andy looked at the printers that we have. A DEC Writer III seemed the best candidate, but it needs repair beyond our ability to fix. So it is a bust at VCF museum.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 1:55 PM Andrew Diller via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: Most of the printers at VCF are daisy wheel. So far none of the dot matrix work.
I don’t think we can print from VCF.
— Andrew Diller 267-353-2203
On Feb 27, 2021, at 1:42 PM, Jameel Akari <jakari@bithose.com> wrote:
On Feb 27, 2021, at 12:09 PM, Andrew Diller <dillera@gmail.com> wrote:
Anyone want to talk on discord about this? Who is actually doing it?
Send me an invite to the appropriate Discord, I don’t seem to have it anymore. (Maybe I left because it was idle?)
I will go test my Proprinter and see if it works. It’s been a long time since I’ve tried, and I know I have a second non-working one so hopefully I haven’t confused the two.
I'm at InfoAge and we have greenbar, if needed I'll find a widecarrige printer and see if I can get it to print from a PC
Serial into a DECwriter if you can’t find a printer with a Centronics port. Oh, and a ribbon that isn’t fossilized. :/
.
Let me know if you are actually doing the print-out.
If my printer self-tests ok and I have a ribbon, I’ll fire up my test mule Linux PC that has a parallel port and give it a shot.
— Jameel
-andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:45 AM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
They want a printout only? Not a printer too, right? Bill
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021, 9:34 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I was thinking the same - NLQ might be good enough, assuming the thing still works at all. An OfficeMax store-closing liquidation fated me a full case of greenbar.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:19 AM, Dean Notarnicola <dnotarnicola@gmail.com> wrote:
I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice.
> On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: > > I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.” > >> From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have. > > -- > Jameel Akari > >> On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: >> >> Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? >> Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a >> print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first? >> >> I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages? >> >> Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that >> might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer >> there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc >> running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least >> try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the >> warehouse >> >> When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to >> do of it too. >> >> Bill >
-- Jeff Brace ========================================= Vice President & Board Member Vintage Computer Festival East Show-runner Vintage Computer Federation is a 501c3 charity http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org cell: 732-759-1783
I forgot about my DECwriter! if Mike doesn’t have any luck I’ll go get it. It was working when Herb and I worked on it in 2019. On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 6:09 PM Andrew Diller via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Some more info on the VCF printers.
1. Nice Epson Wide carriage- powers on, but errors immediately and won't print a test page. 2. Diablo 630 - really cool looking printer, clean and powers but goes to alert, print head won't move. Also a daisywheel. 4. Okidata wide carriage- this powers and the test print actually starts but it prints one line and then goes into error condition 5. Decwriter III - this powers up, prints but the take-up spool for the ribbon doesn't work - the ribbon becomes more and more slack. 6.. Decwriter III - this powers up but has an error that won't clear, won't go into local mode.
We really should get the Decwriter and the Diablo working. I'll take a look at them again with some help next week at the Repair day.
We also need to setup a dos system luggable we can use for jobs like this, a Compaq luggable would be perfect with a network card in it to do ftp on the network. I'll ask for some help next weekend to see if any of the seven I saw in the warehouse can be made functional for this job.
The next time we get a request like this, we should be prepared.
-andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 4:10 PM, Jeffrey Brace <jeffrey@vcfed.org> wrote:
OK. An update Andy looked at the printers that we have. A DEC Writer III seemed the best candidate, but it needs repair beyond our ability to fix. So it is a bust at VCF museum.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 1:55 PM Andrew Diller via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: Most of the printers at VCF are daisy wheel. So far none of the dot matrix work.
I don’t think we can print from VCF.
— Andrew Diller 267-353-2203
On Feb 27, 2021, at 1:42 PM, Jameel Akari <jakari@bithose.com> wrote:
On Feb 27, 2021, at 12:09 PM, Andrew Diller <dillera@gmail.com> wrote:
Anyone want to talk on discord about this? Who is actually doing it?
Send me an invite to the appropriate Discord, I don’t seem to have it anymore. (Maybe I left because it was idle?)
I will go test my Proprinter and see if it works. It’s been a long time since I’ve tried, and I know I have a second non-working one so hopefully I haven’t confused the two.
I'm at InfoAge and we have greenbar, if needed I'll find a
widecarrige printer and see if I can get it to print from a PC
Serial into a DECwriter if you can’t find a printer with a Centronics port. Oh, and a ribbon that isn’t fossilized. :/
.
Let me know if you are actually doing the print-out.
If my printer self-tests ok and I have a ribbon, I’ll fire up my test mule Linux PC that has a parallel port and give it a shot.
— Jameel
-andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:45 AM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
They want a printout only? Not a printer too, right? Bill
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021, 9:34 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I was thinking the same - NLQ might be good enough, assuming the thing still works at all. An OfficeMax store-closing liquidation fated me a full case of greenbar.
-- Jameel Akari
> On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:19 AM, Dean Notarnicola < dnotarnicola@gmail.com> wrote: > > > I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice. > > >> On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: >> >> I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.” >> >>> From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have. >> >> -- >> Jameel Akari >> >>> On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: >>> >>> Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? >>> Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a >>> print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first? >>> >>> I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages? >>> >>> Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that >>> might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer >>> there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc >>> running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least >>> try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the >>> warehouse >>> >>> When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to >>> do of it too. >>> >>> Bill >>
-- Jeff Brace ========================================= Vice President & Board Member Vintage Computer Festival East Show-runner Vintage Computer Federation is a 501c3 charity http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org cell: 732-759-1783
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 4:11 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
OK. An update Andy looked at the printers that we have. A DEC Writer III seemed the best candidate, but it needs repair beyond our ability to fix.
I haven't fired up any of my wide-carriage printers in a long, long time, probably more than 15 years. It doesn't help the deadline, but the DECwriter III is a fine candidate for overhaul on a repair day. They did break back in the day, but they were very repairable. My other favorite low-end DEC printer is the LA-180. It's parallel but shouldn't be hard to drive from a PC parallel port (even a USB parallel port), but it _might_ take a few inverters on the handshaking or status lines (I don't remember the Dataproducts signals off the top of my head, but there was an ASCII-art file on Usenet for how to hook a lineprinter up to a PC with some 7404s in it). One thing about the DEC mechanisms I wanted to mention given the season - I used to have my LA180 in an unheated basement in the 80s and it did _not_ like printing in cold weather. It would blow motor fuses. Printed just fine above +60F. Did _not_ work below about +50F. If it's too cold for you, it's too cold for the printer.
So it is a bust at VCF museum.
I was looking over the file and this was at the top... # The contents of the "Colossus249" files, in general, are transcribed # from a scanned document obtained from MIT's website, # http://hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/archive/1701.pdf. I'd like to note # that the character-set of the line-printer used must not have completely # agreed with the one the developers had in mind, so I've interpreted various # wacky symbols appearing in the print as follows: # Print Interpretation # ----- -------------- # plus-minus < # lower-case Greek delta > # lower-case Greek nu | (sometimes) # strange lower-case d & # trailing ' : # other still uninterpreted I wonder what the printer was that had delta, vu, and +/- This is apparently what the original from 1968 looked like... http://www.ibiblio.org/apollo/ScansForConversion/Colossus249-Martin/ -ethan
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:46 AM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
They want a printout only? Not a printer too, right?
Just a printout. They will use it as prop.
Bill
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021, 9:34 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I was thinking the same - NLQ might be good enough, assuming the thing still works at all. An OfficeMax store-closing liquidation fated me a full case of greenbar.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 9:19 AM, Dean Notarnicola <dnotarnicola@gmail.com> wrote:
I was guessing that they would want wide carriage and impact printing, depending on the time period. I got my proprinter xl out of mothballs as well (the NLQ mode may be sufficient) , but the bigger challenge is finding greenbar on short notice.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:14 AM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I will dust off my Proprinter XL and work on it too if the details include “dot-matrix is ok.”
From the context I’m guessing they’re really looking for that band/chain printer look that a 1980s DMP doesn’t have.
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 26, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages?
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to do of it too.
Bill
On Fri, Feb 26, 2021 at 11:28 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
Now that I have interested people with possible printers, I will share the file and you can figure it out. I don't really know the details other than she wants 10 pages printed out and 5 sets of those 10 pages. Here is the text file: Colossus249.txt <https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fC6xmm6MgXjP87DL3JIeAT_cYQotPKkZ/view?usp=drive_web> Here it is as a zip: Colossus 249.zip <https://drive.google.com/file/d/1615Ui7zevANVRqcXRYFB0NS-AfBIrjmi/view?usp=drive_web>
I recall you said it was roughly a hundred or so total pages?
10 pages from the text file, and 5 sets of those. A total of 50 pages.
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
Unfortunately there isn't anyone near the museum who has the technical knowledge to do this. We certainly have the paper and the machines, but not the technical knowledge to setup, troubleshoot and print it.
When the file and details are available I would be happy to at least try to do of it too.
Bill
On February 27, 2021 1:05:19 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
Unfortunately there isn't anyone near the museum who has the technical knowledge to do this. We certainly have the paper and the machines, but not the technical knowledge to setup, troubleshoot and print it.
Huh?? Jeff, I'm willing to bet that pretty much everyone here has been connecting printers to computers for decades. This is not hard! -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 1:58 PM Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On February 27, 2021 1:05:19 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
Unfortunately there isn't anyone near the museum who has the technical knowledge to do this. We certainly have the paper and the machines, but not the technical knowledge to setup, troubleshoot and print it.
Huh?? Jeff, I'm willing to bet that pretty much everyone here has been connecting printers to computers for decades. This is not hard!
There are only a handful of people near InfoAge me (7 minutes away, Tony 17 minutes away, Corey 35 minutes away). I can tell you that my knowledge of connecting greenbar printers is nil. Don't know about Tony or Corey. We don't know what kind of printers are in the warehouse. We don't know the condition of those printers. We don't know which computers that they hook up to. We don't know if those computers are working. So therefore there is little chance that we have the knowledge of someone close by, a good known and working printer and how to connect, etc. If this was next weekend, then we would have 10 to 15 people from 1 hour plus driving distance and *they* would certainly be able to figure out, troubleshoot, connect, etc. == Jeff
-Dave
-- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
Huh?? Jeff, I'm willing to bet that pretty much everyone here has been connecting printers to computers for decades. This is not hard!
There are only a handful of people near InfoAge me (7 minutes away, Tony 17 minutes away, Corey 35 minutes away). I can tell you that my knowledge of connecting greenbar printers is nil. Don't know about Tony or Corey. We don't know what kind of printers are in the warehouse. We don't know the condition of those printers. We don't know which computers that they hook up to. We don't know if those computers are working. So therefore there is little chance that we have the knowledge of someone close by, a good known and working printer and how to connect, etc.
If this was next weekend, then we would have 10 to 15 people from 1 hour plus driving distance and *they* would certainly be able to figure out, troubleshoot, connect, etc.
== Jeff
Andy and I talked through it based on my memory of what's available at the warehouse. That said, if we could just declare this "132 Character Line Printer Day" and see who "got the stuff". Bill
So, how’re we doing on this? My Proprinter XL24 sorrrta works - but I think its power supply’s caps are too old and tired to overcome old and tired grease, since it stalls or goes into alarm on self-test. I managed to get about 10 lines of self-test out of it before it stalled there too. I can clear my workbench and try to fix it (or work around it) but if somebody else is making better progress, I’ll punt. Given that my other Proprinter won’t power on at all, I’m guessing the PSU caps were only fair-to-middlin' when new, but “new” was at least 25 years ago.
On Feb 27, 2021, at 2:48 PM, Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Huh?? Jeff, I'm willing to bet that pretty much everyone here has been connecting printers to computers for decades. This is not hard!
Two decades, professionally, and I’m kind of a young'un here. :) (Starting out, those were /awesome/ IBM 6262 band printers - with parallel interfaces too! Alas I could not take one home.)
Andy and I talked through it based on my memory of what's available at the warehouse. That said, if we could just declare this "132 Character Line Printer Day" and see who "got the stuff”.
At this point I’d say I’ve half got the stuff, but do I have The Right Stuff? I’ll wait and see. — Jameel
Andy and I talked through it based on my memory of what's available at the warehouse. That said, if we could just declare this "132 Character Line Printer Day" and see who "got the stuff”.
At this point I’d say I’ve half got the stuff, but do I have The Right Stuff? I’ll wait and see.
—
Yup. Are we just posers or what?
My proprinter xl’s head is seized and it’s making unhappy sounds. I’ve got it apart and cleaning it out. Hoping for the best, but still can’t find any green bar locally. On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 3:26 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Andy and I talked through it based on my memory of what's available at the warehouse. That said, if we could just declare this "132 Character
Line
Printer Day" and see who "got the stuff”.
At this point I’d say I’ve half got the stuff, but do I have The Right Stuff? I’ll wait and see.
—
Yup. Are we just posers or what?
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 3:44 PM Dean Notarnicola via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
My proprinter xl’s head is seized and it’s making unhappy sounds. I’ve got it apart and cleaning it out. Hoping for the best, but still can’t find any green bar locally.
Dean. If you get it working, then I can drive up to you with the paper.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 3:26 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Andy and I talked through it based on my memory of what's available
at
the
warehouse. That said, if we could just declare this "132 Character Line Printer Day" and see who "got the stuff”.
At this point I’d say I’ve half got the stuff, but do I have The Right Stuff? I’ll wait and see.
—
Yup. Are we just posers or what?
-- Jeff Brace ========================================= Vice President & Board Member Vintage Computer Festival East Show-runner Vintage Computer Federation is a 501c3 charity http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org cell: 732-759-1783
I’ve got a dozen working printers including wide carriage ones but so far no paper here in central va... Sent from my iPhone
On Feb 27, 2021, at 4:12 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 3:44 PM Dean Notarnicola via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
My proprinter xl’s head is seized and it’s making unhappy sounds. I’ve got it apart and cleaning it out. Hoping for the best, but still can’t find any green bar locally.
Dean. If you get it working, then I can drive up to you with the paper.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 3:26 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
> Andy and I talked through it based on my memory of what's available
at
the
warehouse. That said, if we could just declare this "132 Character Line Printer Day" and see who "got the stuff”.
At this point I’d say I’ve half got the stuff, but do I have The Right Stuff? I’ll wait and see.
—
Yup. Are we just posers or what?
-- Jeff Brace ========================================= Vice President & Board Member Vintage Computer Festival East Show-runner Vintage Computer Federation is a 501c3 charity http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org cell: 732-759-1783
I can try tomorrow, Monday, or Tuesday, but I have not printed anything for a while and will have to experiment. At this point I am curious to see if I can print without it being a big hassle. Bill On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 4:12 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 3:44 PM Dean Notarnicola via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
My proprinter xl’s head is seized and it’s making unhappy sounds. I’ve got it apart and cleaning it out. Hoping for the best, but still can’t find any green bar locally.
Dean. If you get it working, then I can drive up to you with the paper.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 3:26 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Andy and I talked through it based on my memory of what's available
at
the
warehouse. That said, if we could just declare this "132 Character Line Printer Day" and see who "got the stuff”.
At this point I’d say I’ve half got the stuff, but do I have The
Right
Stuff? I’ll wait and see.
—
Yup. Are we just posers or what?
-- Jeff Brace ========================================= Vice President & Board Member Vintage Computer Festival East Show-runner Vintage Computer Federation is a 501c3 charity http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org cell: 732-759-1783
Jeff, I’ll call you On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 4:21 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I can try tomorrow, Monday, or Tuesday, but I have not printed anything for a while and will have to experiment. At this point I am curious to see if I can print without it being a big hassle. Bill
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 4:12 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 3:44 PM Dean Notarnicola via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
My proprinter xl’s head is seized and it’s making unhappy sounds. I’ve got it apart and cleaning it out. Hoping for the best, but still can’t find any green bar locally.
Dean. If you get it working, then I can drive up to you with the paper.
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 3:26 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
> Andy and I talked through it based on my memory of what's
available
at
the
warehouse. That said, if we could just declare this "132 Character Line Printer Day" and see who "got the stuff”.
At this point I’d say I’ve half got the stuff, but do I have The Right Stuff? I’ll wait and see.
—
Yup. Are we just posers or what?
-- Jeff Brace ========================================= Vice President & Board Member Vintage Computer Festival East Show-runner Vintage Computer Federation is a 501c3 charity http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org cell: 732-759-1783
Connecting printers isn't the hard part. The hard part is getting the files from the Internet to the machine you managed to connect to the printer :) Bill's idea of the Decwriter and using a serial printer (rather than parallel) was a great idea, of course I came up without my whole bag and so I had no USB-C -> USB-> Serial adapter in order to print from the Mac right to the DW. I'll test this out next week as it sounds like a good thing to be able to do in a pinch. -andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 2:02 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 1:58 PM Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On February 27, 2021 1:05:19 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
Unfortunately there isn't anyone near the museum who has the technical knowledge to do this. We certainly have the paper and the machines, but not the technical knowledge to setup, troubleshoot and print it.
Huh?? Jeff, I'm willing to bet that pretty much everyone here has been connecting printers to computers for decades. This is not hard!
There are only a handful of people near InfoAge me (7 minutes away, Tony 17 minutes away, Corey 35 minutes away). I can tell you that my knowledge of connecting greenbar printers is nil. Don't know about Tony or Corey. We don't know what kind of printers are in the warehouse. We don't know the condition of those printers. We don't know which computers that they hook up to. We don't know if those computers are working. So therefore there is little chance that we have the knowledge of someone close by, a good known and working printer and how to connect, etc.
If this was next weekend, then we would have 10 to 15 people from 1 hour plus driving distance and *they* would certainly be able to figure out, troubleshoot, connect, etc.
== Jeff
-Dave
-- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
Proprinter lives! Just need to see if I can reliably get tractor feed through it And reconstitute the ribbon On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 6:17 PM Andrew Diller via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Connecting printers isn't the hard part. The hard part is getting the files from the Internet to the machine you managed to connect to the printer :)
Bill's idea of the Decwriter and using a serial printer (rather than parallel) was a great idea, of course I came up without my whole bag and so I had no USB-C -> USB-> Serial adapter in order to print from the Mac right to the DW. I'll test this out next week as it sounds like a good thing to be able to do in a pinch.
-andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 2:02 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 1:58 PM Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On February 27, 2021 1:05:19 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
Unfortunately there isn't anyone near the museum who has the technical knowledge to do this. We certainly have the paper and the machines, but not the technical knowledge to setup, troubleshoot and print it.
Huh?? Jeff, I'm willing to bet that pretty much everyone here has been connecting printers to computers for decades. This is not hard!
There are only a handful of people near InfoAge me (7 minutes away, Tony 17 minutes away, Corey 35 minutes away). I can tell you that my knowledge of connecting greenbar printers is nil. Don't know about Tony or Corey. We don't know what kind of printers are in the warehouse. We don't know the condition of those printers. We don't know which computers that they hook up to. We don't know if those computers are working. So therefore there is little chance that we have the knowledge of someone close by, a good known and working printer and how to connect, etc.
If this was next weekend, then we would have 10 to 15 people from 1 hour plus driving distance and *they* would certainly be able to figure out, troubleshoot, connect, etc.
== Jeff
-Dave
-- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
I also got mine working. The foam that keeps the print head flex cables from binding turned to goo along with all the sound absorbing foam. This was making the print head stick on the leftward pass and the stepper controller detected the jam and shut down. I am impressed. I’m crudely re-inking the ribbon now. It’ll have to soak overnight but I think it’ll come together tomorrow morning. I think I mentioned the DECwriter serial since I know at least some had RS232. The number of dongles needed to interface that from your laptop is ever increasing these days. Might as well have USB-C to current loop at this point! :) -- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 7:23 PM, Dean Notarnicola via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Proprinter lives! Just need to see if I can reliably get tractor feed through it And reconstitute the ribbon
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 6:17 PM Andrew Diller via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Connecting printers isn't the hard part. The hard part is getting the files from the Internet to the machine you managed to connect to the printer :)
Bill's idea of the Decwriter and using a serial printer (rather than parallel) was a great idea, of course I came up without my whole bag and so I had no USB-C -> USB-> Serial adapter in order to print from the Mac right to the DW. I'll test this out next week as it sounds like a good thing to be able to do in a pinch.
-andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 2:02 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 1:58 PM Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On February 27, 2021 1:05:19 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the warehouse
Unfortunately there isn't anyone near the museum who has the technical knowledge to do this. We certainly have the paper and the machines, but not the technical knowledge to setup, troubleshoot and print it.
Huh?? Jeff, I'm willing to bet that pretty much everyone here has been connecting printers to computers for decades. This is not hard!
There are only a handful of people near InfoAge me (7 minutes away, Tony 17 minutes away, Corey 35 minutes away). I can tell you that my knowledge of connecting greenbar printers is nil. Don't know about Tony or Corey. We don't know what kind of printers are in the warehouse. We don't know the condition of those printers. We don't know which computers that they hook up to. We don't know if those computers are working. So therefore there is little chance that we have the knowledge of someone close by, a good known and working printer and how to connect, etc.
If this was next weekend, then we would have 10 to 15 people from 1 hour plus driving distance and *they* would certainly be able to figure out, troubleshoot, connect, etc.
== Jeff
-Dave
-- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On 2/27/21 9:01 PM, Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
I think I mentioned the DECwriter serial since I know at least some had RS232.
Most do, and they're trivial to interface. And I should point out that you can still buy those ribbons new. But not on the timetable of that filmmaker.
The number of dongles needed to interface that from your laptop is ever increasing these days.
Uhh, ONE. A simple USB<->serial adapter.
Might as well have USB-C to current loop at this point! :)
ROFL...priceless. :) -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
If the warehouse has a Commodore DMP-1101, that's a daisywheel, wide carriage printer, too. I have a working one of those myself, but I have no green bar paper to use in it. :( On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:01 PM Jameel Akari via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I also got mine working. The foam that keeps the print head flex cables from binding turned to goo along with all the sound absorbing foam. This was making the print head stick on the leftward pass and the stepper controller detected the jam and shut down. I am impressed.
I’m crudely re-inking the ribbon now. It’ll have to soak overnight but I think it’ll come together tomorrow morning.
I think I mentioned the DECwriter serial since I know at least some had RS232. The number of dongles needed to interface that from your laptop is ever increasing these days. Might as well have USB-C to current loop at this point! :)
-- Jameel Akari
On Feb 27, 2021, at 7:23 PM, Dean Notarnicola via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Proprinter lives! Just need to see if I can reliably get tractor feed through it And reconstitute the ribbon
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 6:17 PM Andrew Diller via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Connecting printers isn't the hard part. The hard part is getting the files from the Internet to the machine you managed to connect to the printer :)
Bill's idea of the Decwriter and using a serial printer (rather than parallel) was a great idea, of course I came up without my whole bag and so I had no USB-C -> USB-> Serial adapter in order to print from the Mac right to the DW. I'll test this out next week as it sounds like a good thing to be able to do in a pinch.
-andy
On Feb 27, 2021, at 2:02 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 1:58 PM Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On February 27, 2021 1:05:19 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
> Maybe someone near the museum can look for the two DECwriter III's that > might still be around the warehouse, or some other wide carriage printer > there. If you put a new ribbon on one of those and attach to an old pc > running word perfect paginated to 132 character lines you could at least > try to print this at infoage. I bet there is some green bar in the > warehouse
Unfortunately there isn't anyone near the museum who has the technical knowledge to do this. We certainly have the paper and the machines, but not the technical knowledge to setup, troubleshoot and print it.
Huh?? Jeff, I'm willing to bet that pretty much everyone here has been connecting printers to computers for decades. This is not hard!
There are only a handful of people near InfoAge me (7 minutes away, Tony 17 minutes away, Corey 35 minutes away). I can tell you that my knowledge of connecting greenbar printers is nil. Don't know about Tony or Corey. We don't know what kind of printers are in the warehouse. We don't know the condition of those printers. We don't know which computers that they hook up to. We don't know if those computers are working. So therefore there is little chance that we have the knowledge of someone close by, a good known and working printer and how to connect, etc.
If this was next weekend, then we would have 10 to 15 people from 1 hour plus driving distance and *they* would certainly be able to figure out, troubleshoot, connect, etc.
== Jeff
-Dave
-- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
On Fri, Feb 26, 2021 at 11:28 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
Now that I have interested people with possible printers, I will share the file and you can figure it out. I don't really know the details other than she wants 10 pages printed out and 5 sets of those 10 pages. Here is the text file: Colossus249.txt <https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fC6xmm6MgXjP87DL3JIeAT_cYQotPKkZ/view?usp=drive_web> Here it is as a zip: Colossus 249.zip <https://drive.google.com/file/d/1615Ui7zevANVRqcXRYFB0NS-AfBIrjmi/view?usp=drive_web>
Some of those lines are over 200 characters long! I have wide greenbar paper and an 800lpm line-matrix printer. I'll see if it runs this evening, and let you know. Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
On Fri, Feb 26, 2021 at 11:28 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
Now that I have interested people with possible printers, I will share the file and you can figure it out. I don't really know the details other than she wants 10 pages printed out and 5 sets of those 10 pages. Here is the text file: Colossus249.txt <https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fC6xmm6MgXjP87DL3JIeAT_cYQotPKkZ/view?usp=drive_web> Here it is as a zip: Colossus 249.zip <https://drive.google.com/file/d/1615Ui7zevANVRqcXRYFB0NS-AfBIrjmi/view?usp=drive_web>
Also, there are 66,168 lines in that file! Which 10 pages does she want? Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 5:48 PM Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
On Fri, Feb 26, 2021 at 11:28 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Can you please send technical details of the printout? Ascii file? Characters per line? Is the printout file ready and all they need is a print or does thenoutput need to be formatted first?
Now that I have interested people with possible printers, I will share the file and you can figure it out. I don't really know the details other than she wants 10 pages printed out and 5 sets of those 10 pages. Here is the text file: Colossus249.txt < https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fC6xmm6MgXjP87DL3JIeAT_cYQotPKkZ/view?usp=d...
Here it is as a zip: Colossus 249.zip < https://drive.google.com/file/d/1615Ui7zevANVRqcXRYFB0NS-AfBIrjmi/view?usp=d...
Also, there are 66,168 lines in that file! Which 10 pages does she want?
Just the first 10 pages. And 5 copies of those pages. Thanks so much! Let me know if you are able to do it :)
Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
-- Jeff Brace ========================================= Vice President & Board Member Vintage Computer Festival East Show-runner Vintage Computer Federation is a 501c3 charity http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org cell: 732-759-1783
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace wrote:
Also, there are 66,168 lines in that file! Which 10 pages does she want?
Just the first 10 pages. And 5 copies of those pages.
Thanks so much! Let me know if you are able to do it :)
The first batch of 10 pages (more like 23 printed pages) has been printed. Sample at: http://q7.neurotica.com/Colossus1.jpg I'll message you off list for more details. Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
On 2/27/21 9:39 PM, Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
The first batch of 10 pages (more like 23 printed pages) has been printed. Sample at:
Oooh, got some line wrappaage there Mike. -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Dave McGuire wrote:
On 2/27/21 9:39 PM, Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
The first batch of 10 pages (more like 23 printed pages) has been printed. Sample at:
Oooh, got some line wrappaage there Mike.
Intentional. Most of the lines are 180-200 characters long, with a LOT of blank space in the middle. If I print it with truncatio beyond 132, most of the later sections just have a short section at the start of the line. Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
On 2/27/21 9:48 PM, Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
The first batch of 10 pages (more like 23 printed pages) has been printed. Sample at:
Oooh, got some line wrappaage there Mike.
Intentional. Most of the lines are 180-200 characters long, with a LOT of blank space in the middle. If I print it with truncatio beyond 132, most of the later sections just have a short section at the start of the line.
Ahhhhh I see. -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:48 PM Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Dave McGuire wrote:
On 2/27/21 9:39 PM, Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
The first batch of 10 pages (more like 23 printed pages) has been printed. Sample at:
Oooh, got some line wrappaage there Mike.
Intentional. Most of the lines are 180-200 characters long, with a LOT of blank space in the middle. If I print it with truncatio beyond 132, most of the later sections just have a short section at the start of the line.
That is something odd - wrapped like it was meant to fit on narrow paper but only if printed on a wide-carriage printer. Makes one wonder what they were really trying to do and if that's it or not. -ethan
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Ethan Dicks wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:48 PM Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Dave McGuire wrote:
On 2/27/21 9:39 PM, Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
The first batch of 10 pages (more like 23 printed pages) has been printed. Sample at:
Oooh, got some line wrappaage there Mike.
Intentional. Most of the lines are 180-200 characters long, with a LOT of blank space in the middle. If I print it with truncatio beyond 132, most of the later sections just have a short section at the start of the line.
That is something odd - wrapped like it was meant to fit on narrow paper but only if printed on a wide-carriage printer.
Makes one wonder what they were really trying to do and if that's it or not.
-ethan
I goofed on the first run: I had the columns set to 80, instead of 132. Here's the updated version: http://q7.neurotica.com/Colossus1.jpg Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
On 2/27/21 10:08 PM, Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
That is something odd - wrapped like it was meant to fit on narrow paper but only if printed on a wide-carriage printer.
Makes one wonder what they were really trying to do and if that's it or not.
-ethan
I goofed on the first run: I had the columns set to 80, instead of 132. Here's the updated version:
MUCH better! -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 10:08 PM Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Ethan Dicks wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 9:48 PM Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Dave McGuire wrote:
On 2/27/21 9:39 PM, Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
The first batch of 10 pages (more like 23 printed pages) has been printed. Sample at:
Oooh, got some line wrappaage there Mike.
Intentional. Most of the lines are 180-200 characters long, with a LOT of blank space in the middle. If I print it with truncatio beyond 132, most of the later sections just have a short section at the start of the line.
That is something odd - wrapped like it was meant to fit on narrow paper but only if printed on a wide-carriage printer.
Makes one wonder what they were really trying to do and if that's it or not.
-ethan
I goofed on the first run: I had the columns set to 80, instead of 132. Here's the updated version:
Thanks so much for this Mike! It's awesome that you could do this on such short notice.
Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace wrote:
I goofed on the first run: I had the columns set to 80, instead of 132. Here's the updated version:
Thanks so much for this Mike! It's awesome that you could do this on such short notice.
I got lucky. That printer hasn't been run since 2009. :-) Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 11:45 PM Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace wrote:
I goofed on the first run: I had the columns set to 80, instead of 132. Here's the updated version:
Thanks so much for this Mike! It's awesome that you could do this on such short notice.
I got lucky. That printer hasn't been run since 2009. :-)
So someone else pointed out that dot matrix printout isn't historically accurate. So what kind of printer would have actually been used for the Apollo 8 code?
Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 11:45 PM Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace wrote:
I goofed on the first run: I had the columns set to 80, instead of 132. Here's the updated version:
Thanks so much for this Mike! It's awesome that you could do this on such short notice.
I got lucky. That printer hasn't been run since 2009. :-)
So someone else pointed out that dot matrix printout isn't historically accurate. So what kind of printer would have actually been used for the Apollo 8 code?
A chain-train or drum printer, such as an IBM 1403. The CHM has a working 1403 on their 1401 system. I wonder why she didn't contact them? Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 11:58 PM Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace wrote:
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 11:45 PM Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace wrote:
I goofed on the first run: I had the columns set to 80, instead of 132. Here's the updated version:
Thanks so much for this Mike! It's awesome that you could do this on such short notice.
I got lucky. That printer hasn't been run since 2009. :-)
So someone else pointed out that dot matrix printout isn't historically accurate. So what kind of printer would have actually been used for the Apollo 8 code?
A chain-train or drum printer, such as an IBM 1403. The CHM has a working 1403 on their 1401 system. I wonder why she didn't contact them?
Oh she contacted CHM first. And the director of CHM referred her to us! You forget that CHM is closed because of Covid-19 and that no one can go into work on anything now. So no one would be allowed to print it for her.
Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
On Sat, Feb 27, 2021 at 11:58:32PM -0500, Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace wrote:
So someone else pointed out that dot matrix printout isn't historically accurate. So what kind of printer would have actually been used for the Apollo 8 code?
A chain-train or drum printer, such as an IBM 1403. The CHM has a working 1403 on their 1401 system. I wonder why she didn't contact them?
If you look at the scans http://www.ibiblio.org/apollo/ScansForConversion/Colossus249-Martin/ The characters shift vertically so most likely a drum. The band/chain tend to shift more side to side. Side to side shift is said to be less objectionable than vertical shift so the 1403 was considered to have good print quality. Some of the DEC maindec listing have really annoying vertical shift.
On 2/27/21 10:58 PM, Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace wrote:
So someone else pointed out that dot matrix printout isn't historically accurate. So what kind of printer would have actually been used for the Apollo 8 code?
A chain-train or drum printer, such as an IBM 1403. The CHM has a working 1403 on their 1401 system.
Ugh, memories. The 1403 had a worm gear to raise the lid, and occasionally ours would fail. If that happened, the only way to operate the printer until the CE arrived was to prop it open with a two-by-four like a car hood. We even had a specially measured two-by-four with a "V" notch cut in one end for this purpose. One of the guys before me had written on it in magic marker "IBM Butt-Whacker, Part No. ..." We had this kind: https://bit.ly/2P9tC15 Of course, hearing loss was almost inevitable if you used it that way... -- Glenn Holmer (Linux registered user #16682) "After the vintage season came the aftermath -- and Cenbe."
On 2/27/21 11:50 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
So someone else pointed out that dot matrix printout isn't historically accurate. So what kind of printer would have actually been used for the Apollo 8 code?
A band, drum, or chain printer -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
The VCF univac has a drum printer now! It would be hard to get this printed on the univac however.... But it sounds like a daisy-wheel would be more visually appropriate- so the Diablo 630 at VCF would be a good candidate for future use if we can fix it. -andy
On Feb 28, 2021, at 12:04 AM, Dave McGuire via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On 2/27/21 11:50 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
So someone else pointed out that dot matrix printout isn't historically accurate. So what kind of printer would have actually been used for the Apollo 8 code?
A band, drum, or chain printer
-Dave
-- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On February 28, 2021 12:17:09 AM Andrew Diller <dillera@gmail.com> wrote:
But it sounds like a daisy-wheel would be more visually appropriate- so the Diablo 630 at VCF would be a good candidate for future use if we can fix it.
A daisy wheel with a cloth ribbon would probably be just about perfect, visually. -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Mike Loewen via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
On Sat, 27 Feb 2021, Jeffrey Brace wrote:
Also, there are 66,168 lines in that file! Which 10 pages does she want?
Just the first 10 pages. And 5 copies of those pages.
Thanks so much! Let me know if you are able to do it :)
The first batch of 10 pages (more like 23 printed pages) has been printed. Sample at:
BTW, this is the printer that's doing the work: http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/Printers/#LDM800 Cost me all of $5.00 at Goodwill. :-) Mike Loewen mloewen@cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://q7.neurotica.com/Oldtech/
participants (13)
-
Andrew Diller -
Bill Degnan -
Dave McGuire -
David Gesswein -
Dean Notarnicola -
Dean Notarnicola -
Ethan Dicks -
Glenn Holmer -
Jameel Akari -
Jeffrey Brace -
jsalzman＠gmail.com -
Mike Loewen -
W. Bryan Caudle