0057 A mystery data recorder, a hurt Sun SPARCstation IPC and a MEGA little TV

Welcome to the next SMMC video. This time we have some interesting gear to look at that hasn't been featured on the channel before. I hope everyone likes the new camera setup for SMMC videos!
-- Video Links
NewTek NDI camera app: (in use in this video)
play.google.com/store/apps/de...
apps.apple.com/us/app/ndi-hx-...
Recapping the SPARCstation IPC:
users.glitchwrks.com/~glitch/...
13W3 differences between Sun and SGI:
ps-2.kev009.com/rs6000/13w3/13...
Adrian's Digital Basement Merch store:
my-store-c82bd2-2.creator-spr...
Support the channel on Patreon:
/ adriansdigitalbasement
Adrian's Digital Basement (Main Channel)
/ @adriansdigitalbasement
-- Tools
Deoxit D5:
amzn.to/2VvOKy1
store.caig.com/s.nl/it.A/id.16...
O-Ring Pick Set: (I use these to lift chips off boards)
amzn.to/3a9x54J
Elenco Electronics LP-560 Logic Probe:
amzn.to/2VrT5lW
Hakko FR301 Desoldering Iron:
amzn.to/2ye6xC0
Rigol DS1054Z Four Channel Oscilloscope:
www.rigolna.com/products/digi...
Head Worn Magnifying Goggles / Dual Lens Flip-In Head Magnifier:
amzn.to/3adRbuy
TL866II Plus Chip Tester and EPROM programmer: (The MiniPro)
amzn.to/2wG4tlP
www.aliexpress.com/item/33000...
TS100 Soldering Iron:
amzn.to/2K36dJ5
www.ebay.com/itm/TS100-65W-MI...
EEVBlog 121GW Multimeter:
www.eevblog.com/product/121gw/
DSLogic Basic Logic Analyzer:
amzn.to/2RDSDQw
www.ebay.com/itm/USB-Logic-DS...
Magnetic Screw Holder:
amzn.to/3b8LOhG
www.harborfreight.com/4-inch-...
Universal ZIP sockets: (clones, used on my ZIF-64 test machine)
www.ebay.com/itm/14-16-18-20-...
RetroTink 2X Upconverter: (to hook up something like a C64 to HDMI)
www.retrotink.com/
Plato (Clone) Side Cutters: (order five)
www.ebay.com/itm/1-2-5-10PCS-...
Heat Sinks:
www.aliexpress.com/item/32537...
Little squeezy bottles: (available elsewhere too)
amzn.to/3b8LOOI
--- Links
My GitHub repository:
github.com/misterblack1?tab=r...
Commodore Computer Club / Vancouver, WA - Portland, OR - PDX Commodore Users Group
www.commodorecomputerclub.com/
--- Instructional videos
My video on damage-free chip removal:
• How to remove chips wi...
--- Music
Intro music and other tracks by:
Nathan Divino
@itsnathandivino

[@adriansdigitalbasement2]

Patrons have uncovered some interesting links and information on the TEAC Data recorder: NASA used the Teac back in the day: ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/19960028116/downloads/19960028116.pdf (Page 6) Datasheet for the Teac: (Sort of) www.testequipmentdatasheets.com/index_cards/T/TEAC/XR-5000,_XR-5000WB,_XR-7000,_XR-9000.pdf and www.artisantg.com/info/TEAC_XR_7000_Datasheet_201710191387.pdf From Patron Jim: The TEAC XR-7000 is an FM data recorder or data logger. In the early days we didn't have a slew of digital data formats. The analog data went into an FM modulator which allowed analog data to be recorded as a frequency modulated signal. Here is a patent application which may help you understand the technology: patents.justia.com/patent/4420774. From Patron Jason: This scientific data recorder can be used for electrophysiology recordings, among other types of electrical data. We had a similar device in the first lab I worked in. We used them for recording voltages in cells with various ion channels, in a technique known as patch clamping en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patch_clamp They were also used in EEG and EMG experiments, from what I can see in the scientific literature Recorders like this used inexpensive easy-to-find media that could hold a lot of information, such as VHS, to store this data. Each channel of electrical data would be connected to the input BNC connectors. It could then be played back for analysis later using either the output row of BNC connectors or connected to a computer using Data Acquisition (DAQ) via one of the back panel connectors. The rear panel connectors also allowed for controlling the start and stop of recording based on signals from sensors or other equipment. A popular DAQ manufacturer is National Instruments which still makes DAQs that use the GPIB interface (a standard interface for this type of device). National Instrument's DAQs use LabView software, hence why it showed up in your search. Given the computational power needed, it would make logistical and economic sense to have multiple data recorders like this one throughout a lab or research facility and save the data to tape. Then play back the data on the one expensive computer workstation, which may have been shared across multiple scientists and sometimes across laboratories. Alternatively, the computer workstation could be used for multiple purposes and hooked up to a wide range of scientific instruments and switching between them as needed; this is how it was in the first lab I worked in with the high-end NeXT UNIX workstations. These devices fell out of favor as computers became more capable of logging data from multiple channels simultaneously at a high sampling rate and saving it in real-time. However, because this data recorder uses pretty standard interfaces, if fully functional and calibrated with the right cables, it could be used in a lab with modern computers with modern DAQs. Some papers that used the TEAC XR-7000 doi.org/10.1590/S0100-879X2004000600014 doi.org/10.1242/jeb.198.3.805 doi.org/10.1161/01.CIR.90.3.1368 Sun IPC Info: Review of it: archive.org/details/byte-magazine-1991-02/page/n218/mode/1up Recapping the SPARCstation IPC: users.glitchwrks.com/~glitch/2017/07/24/ipc-recap 13W3 differences between Sun and SGI: ps-2.kev009.com/rs6000/13w3/13w3_pinout.html

[@rager1969]

While interesting to look at, it's not of any use to you. I guess you could post it to the Craigslist free section rather than sending to eWaste.

[@Hitek146]

A friend of mine restores vintage radios, and he let me restore one I had using his shop and supplies. The string he gave me to use worked perfectly, and I recall it was something you can still buy that is actually made for another use, but I don't recall exactly what. I've asked him, and when he responds, I'll let you know here...

[@thenormanfair]

I came here to post about the 13W3 differences, but you already found out.

[@ultrametric9317]

This is just fantastic!

[@InconsistentManner]

for a Dial cord. use "heavy duty" sewing thread.

[@VK2FVAX]

Hi Adrian. It's a very cool little 25mhz SUN4c arch system. The form factor is "lunchbox". You do not need the keyboard (mouse comes off the keyboard much like ADB..kinda) and monitor. If it doesn't detect the keyboard, it'll default to console being off RS232 on the first serial port... Yay..but wait. It may not show any output for upto 20mins. There's an IDprom on it. It's like a PC BIOS dallas chip, that saves a bunch of variables in it (what to boot off, TOD, probe lists for scsi/sbus, ethernet address, system gesalt ID ..kinda). Down side, is when the battery dies on the IDProm, two settings mfgswitch and "diagswitch?" get flipped. This means when it's powered up, it'll sit there running lots of tests on everything before there's any console output (serial or video). So, in the OBP (open boot prompt ..similar to IBM Powers and 'newworld macs') type "printenv", "setenv" or "sifting words" when you get it working. It'll show your the keywords you can use with the OBP which is actually a FORTH interpreter. Once you've fixed the battery, you can re-program the IDProm contents with lots of "mkp" commands and re-write those settings. Then you can nvstore or nvsave to save the new contents. Set the two diag/mgf switches off and it'll come up every time after a few seconds. These are very fun machines. Very old. Quite historic. They're one of SUN and Fujitsu's first generation SPARC systems. They're SPARCv7 systems (like saying 286, 386, 486, pentium..etc). Later systems are SPARCv8, and the 64bit SPARC systems start with SPARCv9 ..onwards. Well worth getting working, not too hard and a good 2-3 videos though :) P.S These guys are supported by upto Solaris 7 (5.7) but not Sol8.. as they removed support for anything below SUN4m. So no SUN4c. Solaris 2.5 (aka SunOS 5.5) is a good fit due to the limited memory and Solaris 7 started to include silly amounts of Java apps. These guys are well supported to this day by NetBSD and there's plenty of enthusiasts running systems of this age, especially lunchboxen. Very popular form factor ..I guess it's a bit like all-in-one mac's from the UNIX world in a sense. Google search terms: "SUN idprom hack" and "SUN hardware reference" and "Re-programming SUN NVRAM after replacement". They also will netboot and run completely diskless over ethernet ..but you would want to have it hosted from other SUN or linux systems. Easiest to configure from another Solaris system. Best Wishes from Australia.

[@schnuder]

The TEAC is a scientific data recorder that can be used for electrophysiology recordings, among other types of electrical data. We had a similar device in the first lab I worked in during the mid 90s. We used them for recording voltages in cells with various ion channels in a technique known as patch clamping. They were also used in EEG and EMG experiments, from what I can see in the scientific literature.

[@schnuder]

Recorders like this used inexpensive easy-to-find media that could hold a lot of information, such as VHS, to store this data. Each channel of electrical data would be connected to the input BNC connectors. It could then be played back for analysis later using either the output row of BNC connectors or connected to a computer using Data Acquisition (DAQ) via one of the back panel connectors. The rear panel connectors also allowed for controlling the start and stop of recording based on signals from sensors or other equipment. A popular DAQ manufacturer is National Instruments which still makes DAQs that use the GPIB interface (a standard interface for this type of device). National Instrument's DAQs use LabView software, hence why it showed up in your search. Given the computational power needed, it would make logistical and economic sense to have multiple data recorders like this one throughout a lab or research facility and save the data to tape. Then play back the data on the one expensive computer workstation, which may have been shared across multiple scientists and sometimes across laboratories. Alternatively, the computer workstation could be used for multiple purposes and hooked up to a wide range of scientific instruments and switching between them as needed; this is how it was in the first lab I worked in with the high-end NeXT UNIX workstations. These devices fell out of favor as computers became more capable of logging data from multiple channels simultaneously at a high sampling rate and saving it in real-time. However, because this data recorder uses pretty standard interfaces, if fully functional and calibrated with the right cables, it could be used in a lab with modern computers with modern DAQs.

[@adriansdigitalbasement2]

@@schnuder It sounds like a neat solution to a data problem that can be tackled with a computer now -- but I could see the value back then.

[@schnuder]

@@adriansdigitalbasement2 Yes, it was a very interesting solution to the problem. The lab I worked in had a bookshelf full of VHS cassettes with likely gigabytes of data. Also, considering the nature of the data and looking a bit more closely at the video, I think it's plausible that the recording mechanism in terms of how the tape head and such worked may have been different from those used in standard video VCRs. The goal was to record lots of real-time data and store it on inexpensive media. Still, like most scientific hardware, the recording and playback hardware was a major financial investment by university laboratories and other organizations using these recorders.

[@stpworld]

Hi Adrian I have a Macintosh workgroup server 60 that needs saving it won’t get past the chime and then it plays the crash up sound id really like to save it if I can is there any way you could help me out?

[@Bubu567]

I assume there would be bandwidth limits though, unless it runs at some inhuman speed? I remember VHS having a ~3.5Mhz bandwidth limit, which was lower than broadcast TV, and is responsible for video signal degradation. I think Type C cassettes existed that had like 5Mhz bandwidth, though...

[@keehandowd]

Hello! We used to use those tape recorders for multi-channel vibration sensor recording when diagnosing rotating machine conditions, usually during a rebuild or commissioning event. A large machine with a driver, gearbox and driven piece could easily have a dozen or two acceleration, velocity and proximity sensors, all of which require waveform sampling synchronised with the machine speed for good machine condition diagnostics. After recording, we'd have to "play it back" into purpose-built condition monitoring sampling hardware and software for analysis. Today we do it all in an SSD-based multi-channel recorder that dumps straight into a database for analysis. Prior to the DAT machine, we recorded on analog multi-channel reel-to-reel tape machines.

[@rzerobzero]

Things I didn't think I'd hear today - "It's like a diaper full of batteries." Love your work :-)

[@rommix0]

To be fair a lot of old batteries are as leaky as baby poop.

[@paulstubbs7678]

@@rommix0 And smell the same?

[@rommix0]

@@paulstubbs7678 I'll let you be the judge of that.

[@TheGreatKingBoo]

Adrian, I think you may be more concerned about production value than some folks watching. I personally like how you do all your videos, I am not too concerned getting all the angles of what you are doing, it's hard to work on something and show others at the same time. Don't feel pressured to always be on your A game, for me it's like hanging out with an old buddy in the basement looking at technological retro goodness. TLDR: Keep on keepin on Adrian, anything you put out is always a good watch for me.

[@transpetaflops]

16:05 "-Please eject!" * Front falls off * Made my day 😀

[@rolandkronqvist1034]

Haha, I bursted into laugh when that happened. :D

[@nickwallette6201]

"What happened?" "The front fell off."

[@averyzucco220]

You can use the TEAC to record oscilloscope data. These were used as a way to store data on cheap, off the shelf storage media before the data was stored on the lab computer itself. When I worked in an electrophys lab we would just store data on the computer itself because the space needed is trivial for modern storage, but you could still find these around some of the older labs. Old equipment tends to just sit around old science labs which can make for some interesting vintage electronics discoveries.

[@lucasRem-ku6eb]

i would say monitoring application, for producing process, lab is never this need, in a lab you do primitive setups, production needs this solution. I have seen it in a Dairy Factory, controlled a 1978 mainframe

[@herdware]

Suns will automatically go to serial console if the keyboard is not connected at boot. I can pretty much guarantee that the NVRAM battery is dead so all the settings are gone (including the ethernet address) but it's a pretty easy fix if you get the power supply working.

[@ntsecrets]

Yup I had one of those in the late 90s. I etched away the side of the nvram battery / rtc module and hooked I think a 3v battery on it and then reprogrammed it. I ran Linux on it.

[@pappakilo3965]

As others have said the TEAC data recorder was commonly used to record parameters during tests of such as vehicles (road, rail & aero). Those recorders replaced the real heavyweight recorders that were an absolute pain to lug around (but afterwards you didn't need to go to the gym). Each of those cards is a frequency modulator/demodulator that had to be set up before a set of tests. There is probably a more conventional channel (#22?) intended for a voice channel so engineers could comment on wat was happening to help with analysis. They are complex beasts indeed! I'm guessing that in terms of original value, that's one of the costliest you've had in your basement. Inputs were commonly derived from amplifiers that would boost the output signal from strain gauges, accelerometers and other transducers. Also possibly conditioned current and voltage from various power supplies that needed to be monitored and analysed. During a recording, signals to the various output BNCs are probably derived from a downstream head so that engineers could check that data were being recorded properly onto tape. But more 'Adrian's Analogue Basement' than digital - probably hybrid though with the control and monitoring functions.

[@samuell.foxton4177]

I wondered about “Adrian’s Analogue Attic” as a spinoff channel name

[@webcme6779]

The “memo” input is for concurrent voice recordings, but I don’t think it’s modulated like the other channels.

[@pappakilo3965]

@@webcme6779 I agree. There's no need for response down to DC with voice so it probably wouldn't be frequency modulated, just a limited bandwidth conventional channel. Back in the 1980s we also used that channel to record a series of pulses that would guide the PDP-11 computer used to digitise and analyse data.

[@dirkwirsbitzki3264]

Poor little sun. I have a soft spot in my heart for Sun and Solaris. I spent way too much time fiddling around with these machines instead of studying back in my university days. However, they have a common problem. The nvram gets corrupted or deleted when the battery is empty. They loose their serial numbers, MAC Adresses and other stuff and won't boot, at least not easily.

[@pappakilo3965]

Has anybody dumped the NVRAM and made its contents available on line? Do you know if the essential values are stored in a from where they could be copied across to another machine and possibly edited?

[@TheStefanskoglund1]

Normally the MAC address is printed on a sticker somewhere inside the machine, so it is fairly easy to correctly program at least these NVRAMs.

[@Hiraghm]

That rig reminds me of my old "portable" tv I got from J.C. Penney back when the world was young. I used to record "Cosmos" broadcasts (with Carl Sagan) onto audio cassettes while watching it on b/w 5" TV.

[@paulaxford6754]

The IPC will need (3) 3300u 10v, (1) 1000u 25v, (1) 470u 25v, (1) 220u 16v if it's the same as mine which I suspect it will be, basically all DC output filter caps. You'll need a SCSI-1 or 2 hard disk of about 500 MB, parity on, ID=3. The NVRAM / RTC will need a new cell grafted in as well. If there is no keyboard detected it defaults to serial console, a 96008N1 serial terminal. Solaris 2.5.1 will work on this machine but it will take overnight to complete the install and you need more RAM, just PC type, 1 and 4MB up to 48 max. There are no other issues that I'm aware of but this was one of Sun's lowest price machines and it's slow. Frankly I think your example is a bit too rough to make a worthwhile restoration as these are not rare. Don't forget a monitor needs to be composite sync compatible. The base video is monochrome but it looks like it has a colour add-in card.

[@JohnGotts]

The SPARC IPX (one year newer than the IPC) was the computer that got me on the Internet (Usenet newsgroups mainly) in 1993, introduced me to the UNIX shell and X, and led me to becoming a Linux developer from May 1994 through to the present day. SunOS 4 was old and nasty BSD. When I started working for my university as a sysadmin our team got busy upgrading those boxes to Solaris (based on System V). Linux with GNU tools was better but Solaris wasn't horrible. A good bridge. Definitely worth fixing.

[@lucasRem-ku6eb]

it was all TCP/IP UNIX related, cool people never collected it....

[@espressomatic]

Anyone else imagine Seth's full-time job is sourcing and mailing things to Adrian?

[@danhorton6182]

Hi Adrian, I’m down in Salem, about an hour south of you. I rebuild vintage electronics for a living, I restring tuners and other variable capacitor devices quite frequently and use braided fishing line. It works great as it’s very strong and most importantly it’s no stretch.

[@neillthornton1149]

Sweet, an IPC! I have restored a bunch of IPXs over the last few years which is the IPC's slightly faster brother. The power supply will almost certainly need to be re-capped, the real time clock that is also an EEPROM that stores things like the serial number will almost certainly be bad. You can actually just use an ATX small form factor power supply to bypass the old Sony power supply entirely if you want. SCSI2SD cards work well as an SSD replacement, they are large enough that you can install SunOS on one "disk", NetBSD on another, etc. Happy to give you any hints or help you need!

[@damouze]

Please keep in mind that the adapter for SGI does not have the exact same pinout that the connector on the Sun has. Btw... Sun machines are always cool ;-), as are SGI machines. Unless they run hot of course, which the larger ones tended to do. A Sun V440 will easily draw 50W of power, just by being connected to the grid. And once you turn it on, it will draw 450-550W of power and you will be able to hear it from the other side of your appartment.

[@RayBrooks0]

Just acquired an IPC and have exactly the same damage. Adrian, you legend ❤️ Thank you

[@kaitlyn__L]

It’s kinda cute how you’re independently rediscovering the speed and utility of filming “live to tape” instead of piecing it together after the fact! It used to be much more common in TV than it presently is.

[@lucasRem-ku6eb]

he is not creative, just found it in the dump.... Cool people would never post it, it's not a 32 track cool music recorder

[@jamesrowden303]

@@lucasRem-ku6eb That's so not what the person you are replying to said.

[@lucasRem-ku6eb]

@@jamesrowden303 Stupid nerdy people can't make a video here, not having social skills, getting only nerdy freaks here..... He needs skills badly !

[@Dr.-Smart]

yes vhs cassettes are used , it doesnt use a spinning drum (its like a glorified reel to reel unit) , its for plain electrical signals , basicly a oscilloscope data recorder (is screaming at the screen ) the tapedrive is gummed up , like your harddrive stepper motors , a lil oil in the right place would be kind to the machine , the tape cracling you hear is possibly caused the the two rubber "rollers" you can see , their rubber is probably hard as a rock (if not give them a good cleaning ) as for the screen not working , try the "monitor out" in the front bottom left if its composite out

[@kaitlyn__L]

Oh, that comment about the problem of a black background with white text, made me realise that must be why the Spectrum ZX80 used a white background and black text. Maybe also the Macintosh!

[@pcm2012]

The watchman modified for video composite input would be a great tiny monitor for a great tiny microcomputer: The ZX Spectrum!!!

[@MrAsBBB]

love your channel as it’s ultra nostalgic for me as having worked with all of these things from a sys admin point of view for many years. Sun , SGI pdp, vax etc. Just wish I didn’t dump everything when I moved on. The trouble was I needed a huge store house to keep it in plus the time to fix it.I am glad I see this stuff now. Thank you..

[@tschak909]

to be more specific, say you had a bunch of test equipment, e.g. oscilloscopes, lab equipment, and you wanted to be able to archive the whole thing to play back later, you'd hook all your test equipment up to this, and e.g. use the GPIB (IEEE-488) to control it from a lab computer.

[@lucasRem-ku6eb]

i would say monitoring application, for producing process, lab is never this need, in a lab you do primitive setups, production needs this solution. I have seen it in a Dairy Factory, controlled a 1978 mainframe My nephew makes systems for this need in the UK, but is guess the website did say it all, but he still is not understanding what it is, lol

[@superslammer]

I had one of those sparc stations. I loved it :) I had the hard drive and a CD ROM as a separate unit that stacked on top :)

[@Codeaholic1]

The IPC form factor is adorable, a lunch box. Sadly that's probably the best thing about it. The Sun4c is slooow. Solaris 2.5.1 or 2.6 would probably be best on it. The serial port is an A B port with both serial ports on a single 25 pin connector. It will have a serial console on one port, usually 9600. The break key interrupts the boot process to get to the Ok prompt. Good luck have have fun.

[@tim1724]

Important: The SGI video connector has a different pinout from the Sun video connector! I don't remember exactly what the difference was, but I'm pretty sure that at a minimum the sync was on a different pin. I used those old Suns a tiny bit around 1997, but even then they were old. (My department had almost entirely moved on to the later UltraSPARC models by then.) I might have a Sun video adapter somewhere. I used to have Sun keyboards/mice but I got rid of all of those 10-15 years ago. You can definitely run it headless via the serial port. They come up with the console running on the serial port at 9600 bps IIRC. I'm pretty sure Sun's serial port pinout was the same as Apple's. The SPARCStation IPC is a pretty nice little Sun. They supported it for years and years, at least up through Solaris 2.5, because I remember installing that version on one. (One of the first times I worked with Sun hardware.) It was horribly slow on that machine, though. You might be better off running the old BSD-based SunOS or Linux. Although I think it may have been slow because the one I used had barely any RAM; put 32 MB in there and it would probably run fine. These things can boot off an external SCSI hard drive, and that's the easiest way to install an OS on a blank hard drive. There ought to be SunOS or Solaris install images out there somewhere. I'm sure I don't have any anymore. These things used those annoying clock chips with the integrated battery. (Not Dallas but some other brand.) So that'll be dead. So some things won't work unless you find a way to replace that. I'm not sure about the IPC but a lot of Suns from that era stored the ethernet MAC address on the clock chip so ethernet may not work right without it. (ugh)

[@adriansdigitalbasement2]

I found a link talking about the 13W3 differences. I have to say I didn't know these differences existed! Lame! ps-2.kev009.com/rs6000/13w3/13w3_pinout.html So I'll need to sort that out after I sort out the power supply issue. I looked at it last night and many components are very corroded in it, so I may need to just replace the entire thing with a PicoATX. We shall see!

[@tinfoilcat]

@@adriansdigitalbasement2 You can fix the NVRAM (it's the IC with the yellow sticker) using this method: kzbin.info/www/bejne/aZ2zZaWOqsZkgtE I like the IPC/IPX form factor since it goes so well together with expansion chassis like the Sun 411 or 911. I had a boatload of that stuff but gave it away 10 years ago. I would say that it makes sense using it either like a simple headless server with NetBSD or expanded with fun stuff with a period correct OS. Seeing that you do not have Sun stuff you might be better off passing it on to other Sun people/trading it since this needs a lot of work and pheripherals to make a fun machine apart from simply running NetBSD over serial.

[@tinfoilcat]

But if you know people with Sun stuff I would encourage you to try some out! The multi CPU SparcServers (or SparcStation 10/20) are cool, as well as the early 68k machines.

[@poofygoof]

I love the IPX / IPC form factor, and the level of integration really impressed teenage me. The design was by Frog Design of mac fame. I had a few IPX (same form factor) of these years ago and they ran NetBSD as well as could be expected for a 40MHz machine. (IPX is 40MHz, your IPC is only 25MHz.) Serial console is the way to run these, they never had great graphics performance even when they were new. You can use mac serial cables; I forget if they need a null modem adapter. As others have pointed out, if there is no keyboard plugged in they will default to serial output. That power supply looks in rough shape, I wonder if it could be retrofitted with a more modern one?

[@lucasRem-ku6eb]

monitor is not video out, sorry

[@ftrueck]

The TEAC looks like a device that curious marc could restore and use 😀

[@marshallberry8943]

The best dial cord to restring tuning indicators is woven nylon flyfishing line Has very little stretch and ties into knots very well

[@Psychlist1972]

I love those old Sun workstations!

[@adambaranek]

looking forward to the SPARCstation repair video!!

[@bobblum5973]

I have the very same FD-500 Mega Watchman, including the AC and DC "cigarette lighter" power cords. Years ago I had to get a replacement knob from Sony, the only thing was it's a darker gray (perhaps meant for the FD-510?). *Historical note:* I had it on my nightstand, turned it on when coworkers on a morning call told me a plane had hit one of the World Trade Center towers. I was watching it live when the second plane hit. 😔

[@paulstubbs7678]

I was up late (from Australia) and saw it as a backdrop to a presenter, it looked so unlike a movie of that type that I knew it was real.

[@pappakilo3965]

In the early 1990s our new boss introduced us to Sun workstations. Assisted by engineers from the Sun distributor in the UK, we assembled a network of five SPARCstations, viz: 2 x SPARCstation 4s; 2 x SPARCstation IPXs and 1 x SPARCstation IPC, together with Sun printers (I can't remember their details) and some standalone drives. The SPARCstation IPC served as a server for the printers, but I can't remember precisely how it and the printers were configured. I'm pretty sure it was installed in 1993, decommissioned in around 1996 and never turned off in that period. Sadly, all of that kit went straight to recycling in around 1998 but a colleague did re-purpose the SCSI HDDs and a standalone Sun CD-ROM drive.

[@TheStefanskoglund1]

That printer IPC probably had a 'somewhat' special frame buffer ie graphics card - connected to the SPARCprinter. The SPARCprinter wasnt by itself particular intelligent - no HPPCL or PostScript built in, instead PostSCript was rendered on the computer and then as a bitmap sent to the printer.

[@ITGR]

Just when I think I’ve seen it all. Thanks for sharing this!

[@frankowalker4662]

That TEAC machine is so cool. I've read the comments about it. Perfect for medical uses.

[@50shadesofbeige88]

Love the new camera setup. That's exactly how I do my filming but I use 2 phones.

[@Electronics-Rocks]

Ok put it as a lay man it is storage scope with 21 channels. The screen should stay on so has a fault. You can get a digital VHS-D the tape was. Slightly different a bit like metal on compact cassettes. These VHS-D was also used for computer backup outlasting the video format. The bottom row of bnc are monitors for the above channels.

[@mlprd]

That will run SunOS for sure and older Sparc Linux and NetBSD. Suns can net-boot so you don't necessarily need a floppy or cdrom that works to install an OS on there. But you could attach an external SCSI cdrom or hard drive if you have any. The very early versions of Solaris might work, but I'm not sure if that IPC processor was ever supported on any Solaris version.

[@nalinux]

I never had succes with Liunx, but NetBSD was perfect.

[@jorgendnilsson]

My university had alot of IPCs back in 1997, they all had monochrome screens. They were way too slow to be fun even then, but you could always use it as a terminal and get the X-session from one of the computer labs faster SUNs, usually Ultras.

[@nalinux]

I used one as a dns/dhcp server in 2000 in the compagny I worked for. Running NetBSD.

[@RowanHawkins]

Yeah, these are the 386 equivalent Terminal stations that kept the kids from running their buggy programming code on the main time share. Your home drive would be NFS mounted to which ever station you logged into. security was poor a fun game was to remote login and play music on someone elses system because /dev/audio wasn't locked to the user on console. Only after became a problem did they start looking at the logs and yelling at people.

[@tiporari]

Think of it like a storage scope. You could hook probes up to it and record data from dozens of channels, like all 16 bits of an address or data bus, and replay them for analysis. The sample rate is probably poor, but it might be fun to play with if you hooked up some scope probes.

[@Stoney3K]

The sample rate of these appeared to be 40KHz but it had quite a long play time, so it was a way of recording data of long running tests which would have been done on things like graphing paper.

[@horusfalcon]

Man, you get all the cool toys! That data recorder looks like it might have come from Michoud Assembly Facility or (maybe) JPL in Pasadena judging from the calibration label. I see where your patrons have found the straight dope on this unit. Good hunting on that - it may prove to be a very interesting restoration.

[@gorak9000]

You can tell where something came from with the most generic calibration label that's on equipment that comes from everywhere? That's an impressive skill

[@horusfalcon]

@@gorak9000 I work at Michoud.

[@gorak9000]

@@horusfalcon I think you missed my point - that green calibration sticker is super generic - I have equipment with that same sticker on it that I'm pretty sure didn't come from JPL, because I know where it ultimately came from because of other inventory control stickers on it that I recognize from the company I work for...

[@Linuxpunk81]

That teac looks similar to some of the recording systems for submarine sonar recordings that I used over the years although never that particular model.

[@JamesHalfHorse]

Looks like something we would have used in studios back in the day to monitor signals. Might try to press the local button to see if the screen stays on. At least on my telemetry that tells the unit to ignore remote and allow local control. It might sleep thinking it is in remote mode.

[@nickk6109]

You got me at Sun SparcStation. Memories of a RGB Sparc during my university year out in industry (the uni had the grey screen all in one units). Colour console text!

[@getdrinking]

I roared with laughter when the door fell off the teac device😂

[@rolandkronqvist1034]

It was like the machine itself wanted and tried so hard to die :D

[@curtiswilbar3571]

As someone mentioned, w/o the keyboard, the Sun will come up on the serial console (A port). IIRC, serial cables for a Mac have the same pinout as the sun (i.e. for an external modem). One of those and a null modem adapter and once you get the power supply up, you can look for life from the system. The NVRAM (module with the yellow sticker on it on the mainboard) will no doubt have a dead battery. This is an MT02, and glitchworks (IIRC) has MT02 repair kit (like repairing Dallas modules). Max RAM IIRC is 12M I believe on the IPC. I'd suggest SunOS 4.1.3, and avoid the later Solaris System V based UNIX as with the low memory and the 25MHZ processor, Solaris 2.X will be terribly slow on there. If you don't have a Mac serial cable, I should still have several.

[@semifavorableuncircle6952]

I had repaired a few of these Sparcstations, the power supplies tend to have leaking (from the bottom, invisible in the early stage) capacitors on the secondary side. Even if it seems to work, replace all before everything burns out.

[@AmazedStoner]

I got to use a mega watchman back in 90’s. I can confirm the performance while watching tv was very good. Battery life wasn’t half bad either. Unfortunately the one my family had had issues back in the 90’s so batteries didn’t work until 2002 when I fixed a bunch of cracked solder joints. I remember watching home improvement the first time I used a mega watchman while camping 😊

[@_chrisr_]

I came across an unused Sparc with similar form factor as that one at my place of work in 1995 - they were designed so that you could add modules which all shared the same case design and stack them together. The additional modules included hard drives, tape drives, CD etc. You daisy chained the power and the SCSI to connect them together. The keyboard has a mouse connector and the mouse was optical. They ran Solaris (or possibly SunOS). The one I saw could boot into the os but it was unstable - which was why it wasn't in use any more.

[@TomFynn]

So now we know who's watching the Watchman.

[@kencreten7308]

A really great one, thanks.

[@jagmarc]

Data recorder I remember this so well! It was great. We (European equivalent to NASA) got one of these tiny things in temporarily to replace a ginormous reel-to-reel multi-track data recorder in a heavy 19" rack cabinet. The AMPEX 15 inch reel data tapes weren't that expensive (300 UKP I think) but they kept disintegrating. When we first saw this tiny machine was dubious but it performed great. Then we went digital hard disk and all the Ampex stuff went to a recording studio startup. Such memories.

[@jk180]

1990, 25Mhz 32bit. Capable of running every version of Solaris up through version 8. They skipped version 9 and jumped to version 10. At version 10 you had to have a 64bit machine. Very capable little machine back in the day. I have a sparcstation 20, and have had a lot of fun with it.

[@nickwallette6201]

?? There was a Solaris 9. I ran that in my very first data center job, until we moved to Solaris 10.

[@jk180]

Oh, you’re right. We skipped over it. Thank you for correcting me.

[@nickblackburn1903]

The teac has old grease causing the issues you had. You need to clean out all the old grease in the transport sections. Cool find!

[@dangerotterisrea]

What ever that Teac thing is..its bloody glorious XD wow!!

[@mgoddard23]

As others have said, you can just use the serial console to interact with the Sparcstation if you aren’t able to find a keyboard and mouse locally. And yeah, be prepared to deal with the dead NVRAM battery. It’s a very easy fix. Once you do get it going, if you really want to run Solaris on it I wouldn’t bother with anything newer than 2.6 but even that might be pushing it. You’d probably have a much a better experience with pre-Solaris versions of SunOS. As for the 13w3 to VGA adapter, it wouldn’t hurt to give the one you already have a try, depending on how it’s constructed and the monitor you’re using it might work, but if you’ve got time before you plan on messing with this thing you might as well order one of the adapter cables that has DIP switches to let you configure how the sync signal is sent. For what it’s worth, when using that cable on my Octane it doesn’t seem to really care how I set the switches for the most part. Maybe my monitor is just really forgiving. I don’t remember if that was the case when using it with any of my Sun stuff.

[@mgoddard23]

Actually, if you haven’t found a Sun keyboard and mouse by VCF East feel free to reach out. I have a set that I’m not using that I can give out on an “extended loan” aka as long as I get it back at some point. I have a few Sun machines but nothing I plan on using any time soon. I’ll be at the expo most likely on Saturday.

[@tookeydookey]

Now that is a great haul!😁👌

[@kanepeterson9775]

Your using NDI! I work for NewTek. I'm happy to hear of people using our technology.

[@adriansdigitalbasement2]

Yeah I heard about it after watching a video on Cathode Ray Dude's channel about newer Video Toaster type stuff running on a PC. A wish is NDI on the phone could do 1080p60 to match my other cameras, but it's such a minor thing.

[@sym0n]

I have a SPARCstation 1+ and use a small KVM that I've had since the mid 90's that has cables for it. It allows me to plug in a PS2 keyboard and mouse and works with the Sun. I used the SPARC with NetBSD which I installed via netboot because I didn't have a working SCSI CDROM at the time. Hope you do something fun with the IPC and it doesn't just collect dust!

[@ProjektSUN]

The Sun SparcStation IPC was a low end "lunch box" workstation, somewhat equivalent in speed to a low end 486. Typically the motherboard on these is fine, I've worked on dozens of them and never had a motherboard issue. That being said, the NVRAM battery is most certainly dead and will need to be replaced or modded with a new battery attached. I've had quite a few of the power supplies in these fail, and due to the size and how many caps need to be replaced, it can be time consuming and somewhat expensive. You might want to talk to some of your Sun friends and see if someone has a working PSU they can part with from another system. These systems are very slow, even when loaded up with max ram (48MB's) and a SCSI2SD card. Your best bets for an operating system are loading up Solaris 2.5, or NetBSD.

[@c128stuff]

Back when I dealt a lot with those Sun IPCs, replacing power supplies was probably the most common 'repair'.. in the late 90s and 2000s there were companies which could run a viable business on just refurbishing those psus (and same for the SGI Indy PSU)

[@DevilishDesign]

Ok, there's that Altair lurking in the background again. Looking forward to finding what that one is all about! :)

[@RudysRetroIntel]

Thanks for sharing. For your mic delay, try to connect directly to your computer instead of wifi. I used AndroidCamX and had the same issue. Once I connect directly, it works fine

[@lucasRem-ku6eb]

he should post a video what he does, he needs final cut badly !

[@SimonQuigley]

I have a couple of sparcstations like that, ipc and lx. Got them netbooting Linux. Never had the keyboard or mouse, or a monitor that could handle the sync rate using a 13w3 adapter to vga. Just used it over the serial port to a Wyse vt terminal. Was fun.

[@jond1536]

I dated one of Sun's Software Engineers, She was Waaaaay smart. She was also pretty high up with Sun and worked with McNealy , Great girl, plenty of money, very wealthy from middle east just a little high strung. Sun SparQ servers started around several hundreds of thousands dollars for the kinda striped down model. Sun systems are very diffucult to understand as a PC guy. Great videos as always

[@TheStefanskoglund1]

not really - partly because they as Liam Proven decribed them recently in the register - they was cost cut to the bone AND so the father to all PCs post 2000. Except the sund-bus type of machines...

[@Dukefazon]

All I found that this TEAC XR-7000 thingy is expensive. The PSU is upside down from where you look at it when the SUN machine is open, meaning the PSU was above all the other components that's inside the machine, that cap juice could easily drip on them. It's not just like it's seeping out, it looks more like it exploded :( I'd love to see you try and fix that PSU and try to make the machine work!

[@PicaDelphon]

It just a Digital Audio Recorder that Works Great for DAC Recorder for the Old Computer hardware, I just So Nice to See the PC Signals Dance in Sync..And Record the Audio/Singles for Play-Back at any Speed...I used these units in a Very Few Audio labs and Studio Main Recordings..

[@JenniferinIllinois]

"Please eject" - throws front cover at Adrian. 🤣

[@PeterMilanovski]

This thing reminds me of my Sony A/D to D/A converter, it essentially takes an analogue audio signal and frequency shifts the signal to a higher frequency in the video band so that you can record audio to VHS tapes on a standard VHS tape machine.... I believe that Technics had something similar with the tape drive mechanism built-in.... While those things are actually pretty amazing, this thing looks to be designed to record analogue signals from sensors or equipment that has some sort of analogue data output.... Not sure but it's definitely a cool looking machine! Who knows, it could possibly record music? You could possibly record multiple channels of dual channel music and be able to switch between music channels from the front panel and being VHS, could possibly give 3hrs or more of continuous music.... I love the sound of that....

[@cwfuntv7618]

I haven’t seen an IPC in a while, used to repair them to chip level. Don’t remember PSU’s failing, but I had loads of them so they were just swapped out. The mother board common faults were the discrete chips (SCSI or Ethernet controller) or ram cache. The NV ram is also a common fault and that contains the hardware and ethernet id. They work in headless mode via the serial port well, and any power on errors are reported that way as well. Intermittent errors are common due to heat, so a can of freeze spray helps find the chips as they start working again. The only thing special about the floppy is electronic eject (as well as the manual via a small hole). The extra card on top is an entry level graphics card.

[@imark7777777]

NDI is amazing. I do a 3 to 4 camera live stream events with MEVOs and one iPhone depending on which one I'm doing. You can set experimental low latency mode in the input on OBS. Otherwise you have to experiment with frame delay and audio delay because most likely the audio was on time and the video is late.

[@SonicBoone56]

Will love to see what comes of the SPARCstation.

[@DaveF.]

Feels more like on for Dave Jones over at Eevblog - but, arg, the shipping! - or possibly Mr Carlson - though I suspect it doesn't have enough (i.e. any) vacuum tubes

[@mellertid]

For the dial cord, one option would be dial cord 😁

[@mndlessdrwer]

Sun Microsystems' stuff has always been just the right amount of quirky to be interesting without being entirely alien.

[@BenState]

I lolled hard when the tape ejected the cover lol

[@kriswillems5661]

I think the recorder just digitizes multiple analogue channels and stores them to tape. I think it is used for scientific research, vibration recording, recording machines test variables, or basically anything where you want to record multiple analogue channels.

[@turtleschmiechen6155]

@34:01 I'd love to see a redesigned cathode drive circuit! As well as the mods. Thanks for the videos.

[@mlprd]

the 9 pin LSI add in card is very likely to be a early Fiber Channel adapter. They used DB9 on gen1 if I remember correctly. The Sun will default to serial console on port A if you don't have the keyboard hooked up.

[@Mueller3D]

It's a monochrome video card for use with Sun's monochrome monitor.

[@dhgodzilla1]

This has a lot of settings my Uncles Audio Equipment from the 80s-90s. It uses ADAT Tapes that look exactly like VHS but its not, it's made for Audio. All the different ports on it are for the various Mics, Guitars, Drums & other Music Eqt. It looks like an ADAT Machine to me. There is also Mini ADATs that use Cassette Tape form factor.

[@ad5mq]

the sparc was a powerful machine in the 90's not much compared to a modern PC you can install linux on them, getting a copy of solaris if the correct vintage could be challenging, and at least on the prior generation of sparc "pizza box" you have to do the initial boot form a tape to initialize a new disk. lovely graphics, these were often used for data visualization and CAD. as well as development. keyboards, mice and probably even power supplies can be found without too much trouble, lots of fans of those machines still about.

[@albinklein7680]

Those Dataloggers were used in seismological monitoring stations and outfits like that. Also in power stations.

[@_chrisr_]

You can set a delay in OBS so that the wireless camera delay can be compensated for. I have wired webcam that I use and have to use about 250ms delay to get stuff to line up.

[@DavePoo2]

25:30 - I still have my Sony Radio alarm clock that I bought when I was a teenager (it's still plugged in and still works), and it still has that "It's a Sony" sticker on the front.

[@WilliamHostman]

Based upon the catalogue entry you referenced: you hook up a bunch of data from lab devices or remote sensors. data on VHS and data on 1/2" RTR videotape have been discussed on several other retrochannels. Techmoan has a vid ona VHS data recorder. those BNC connectors were common for ethernet and a couple other networking protocols; hence why I suspect 10b2 ethernet (it was the standard for both MS and Novell).

[@cobra8142]

Adrian send this to Techmoan, then have Curious Mark and Master Ken fix it...

[@TonyJewell0]

I have a sparcstation in my loft from when I used to do programming on them in the 90s. Must get it down and have a quick check

[@NRoach44]

Those IPCs have dodgy power supplies, and tend to kill the boards. The good news is that you can eject the pins from an AT power supply and use that to power the motherboard - the POK signal can be left disconnected, then it's just +-12V, 5V and GND IIRC A friend of mine has made a USB Mouse / Keyboard to Sun adapator to work on these era Sun machines (github - delan - usb3sun) and we've successfully gotten one to POST with it.

[@GeraldBastelica]

Interesting device! There were also some using 1/4'' or 1/2'' open reels to record "data" (high frequency audio like signals). That makes me wonder: how all signals/data recorded to these kind of analog instrumentation recorders could be preserved/digitized nowadays, assuming you still have a working device to read them back? This one seems to record DC up to 40 kHz, so much more than a usual audio digitizing device, and you also have to preserve synchronization of all channels.

[@timothyp8947]

A long long time ago, when I used to work for ICL, used to both use Sun kit and integrate it into customer projects. The 'shoebox' form factor SPARCstations were my favourites - just for the look. They may not have been super powerful - especially the IPC which I seem to remember being lower end, or at least an early model - but they just felt like the size a desktop computer should be. I assume the battery inside the cmos ram chip will be long dead so the machine won’t remember it’s MAC address or hostid - no idea what modern replacements there might be, if any. If my 25+yo memory of these boxes is working OK, the keyboard/mouse connector is an SDB connector: have a vague recollection this is related to Apple's ADB, although no idea if they’re interchangeable esp with more keys on a Sun keyboard and mouse.

[@jurgmesser7723]

The battery compartment of the Sony TV might be large enough to accommodate a powerbank and a 5V to 12V DC/DC converter board from AliExpress. Just as an idea if someone actually want's to use it portable nowadays.

[@richardbanks2669]

I used to have a tiny TV like that connected to a ZX81 instead of a graphics calculator - my maths teacher was quite bemused 😆

[@maniatore2006]

That Sony MEGA TV is awesome, i try already long time to get one, but it is only available from the USA

[@GarryGri]

Looks like I have the same Sun Spark station (along with the CD, tape and external disk drive SCSI units) . It was all working last time I switched it on a while ago, but when I tryed it recently... nothing. I may still have some cable to connect a terminal to this. I do have a keyboard and mouse, but I'm in the UK! Haven't got around to testing stuff yet.

[@geoffholling4773]

For dial cord, I once used some dacron fishing line (not nylon) and that worked really really well, might be hard to get hold of these days.

[@TheErador]

Can get dacron at archery shops

[@albinklein7680]

​@@TheErador Original dial cord is not that hard to get. Also not expensive.

[@TheErador]

@@albinklein7680 cool. I was really just providing a viable source for dacron - it's used for bowstrings - I'm sure someone still sells dial cord.

[@albinklein7680]

@@TheErador I know! Please don't get me wrong on that matter! It was just a coincidence. I have a vintage tube radio in my kitchen and a few weeks ago the dial cord broke. I went to my local electronics store (I am lucky to have one here in Berlin) and they had three different kinds of dial cord in stock. And the spools they showed me to decide which one I want looked very modern. I just wanted to point out, that dial cord is still made and readily available (at least on mail order). I am glad about that, because there are more than enough radios out there with intricate tuning mechanisms which just don't work right without the proper cord. And you have to be very careful with fishing line or kite string, because that stuff is very hard and abrasive sometimes. It just eats itself in the plastic pulleys of vintage radios. Ask me how I know....

[@siberx4]

There are still some vintage suppliers that will sell spools of proper dial cord, but I've heard that a suitable alternative is braided (cloth-type) fishing line; it's generally quite thin, and does not stretch (which is the important property for dial cord). You might be able to find some at a local hardware or fishing supply store if you don't want to go through the trouble of ordering actual dial cord from a vintage/retro supply place; the fishing line will look a bit different, but it looks like the dial cord isn't even visible in these sets anyway.

[@mellertid]

So the modern dial cords aren't very good?

[@johnsonlam]

Oh, it may be the one used in TV/Radio channel program to record with mixed content since they have lot of voice channel and video together.

[@jaredwright5917]

Somewhere, either on eBay or another KZbin channel, I've seen a similar device to the TEAC recorder that had 8 channels and no display. If it's what I'm thinking of it's basically the equivalent of a low bandwidth storage oscilloscope, where it stores the signal in an analog format on tape instead of a digital format.

[@jarekjagielski366]

Mmmmm, weird huge scientific VHS thingmajig. It's honestly fascinating just how common this format was, and not always for video.

[@ultrametric9317]

This reminded me of a science fiction story, "The Big Front Yard". A guy who tinkers around in his basement notices things are getting fixed, sort of spontaneously. Like those few computers you worked on lately. Turns out aliens are converting his house into a portal in spacetime :) Clifford D. Simak. Now that you have a data recorder, the real shit can begin!

[@frank-christiankruegel2199]

Regarding the Sun IPC: These machines were slow even back in the days. I wouldn't put too much effort into it. And note: there is a battery inside the machine that is guaranteed to be dead by now. This battery is inside a Mostek (now ST) M48T02 NVRAM/RTC chip - a DIP24 chip with an unsuual high package case that contains the chip itself, the crystal and the lithium cell. This chip contains the system identity, hostid, ethernet mac address and other settings. The system won't work propery without a correct nvram. This system has sun4c architecture. You should use SunOS 4.1.4 on it. Mayybe an early Solaris would work, but I'd stick with SunOS. More recent Solaris versions dropped support for sun4c and required sun4m or sun4u. You need a compatible CDROM drive to boot from. The SBus card looks like a monochrome video card for an high resolution monochrome display. You should remove the card - it's not useful without the maching monitor. The onboard graphics is an bwtwo, monochrome 1152*900. No color.