Working for Friends: Sperry Univac UTS-40 and Haunted Diablo Drive

[@dredscallon]

Marc is a very friendly great guy, it is my UTS 40 in the video. Imagine that I just asked him to send me the terminal in the idea to try to repair the UTS 40 that I have at home (and that I try to restart for years now). Spontaneously Marc made a first diagnosis and a small repair attempt, it's really nice. Thanks again ! :-)

[@bombtwenty3867]

Everybody needs friends like you with magic repair skills

[@Asmoharg]

Watching Marc's videos has caused me to rewrite my bucket list. Visiting the Computer History Museum in Mountain View is now very much at the top. Wonder if I can somehow sweettalk the missus and the kids to put that on the agenda if we decide to visit the States (we live in Denmark).

[@rjones8508]

Asmoharg Same here. My wife and I were in Palo Alto a couple years ago and we considered going. But after discovering this series, now kicking ourselves. It's on the list now!

[@douro20]

Also the Living Computer Museum in Seattle if you can.

[@MattTester]

Given the time and money I would fly from the UK right now to see those museums, especially if I could see the 1401. There is a 'streetview' map of the Computer History Museum but it only shows the ground floor (I believe the 1401 is upstairs).

[@mechadrake]

If something has two keys one is for self destruct/or nuke launch and another is for making coffee obviously ;)

[@Captain_Char]

Batteries are the first thing I remove from old machines and give them leads to replacement off the board, so if a leak does occur again, its contained away from the board

[@LarsHeineken]

Especially on old pinball machines.

[@Damien.D]

Also any varta batterie on old computer.

[@pa4tim]

The desolder gun will work even better is you first some fresh solder and then move the tip in small circles to preventing rewetting. Pace has a video about it.

[@BlackEpyon]

In my experience, any kind of desoldering operation works better if you flow fresh solder.

[@DevilsHandyman]

I have a Hakko desoldering gun as well and I find that putting the nozzle over the wire and gently moving it around in a small circle helps melt the solder faster and more evenly resulting in quicker desoldering.

[@Damien.D]

Vigorously shaking the pin in its via works even better.

[@Damien.D]

Guide to corroded boards. 1) cut that f*kin battery. And any suspect component in the damage zone. 2) immerse in vinegar. Brush vigorously. 3) rince throughoutly. Brush even more. 4) dry in oven. 5) desolder pins left from step1, sand the damaged zone to bare copper. Inspect, repair and tin back traces. Optionally, paint a new solder mask with UV-curing mask. 6)replace every component, boot the thing, troubleshoot if necessary. And final 7) step : install a wired battery far away from the board, or a gold cap 1 farad backup capacitor.

[@Sine1040]

Why not remove the leaky battery from hell altogether? It must be dead as a door nail anyway

[@dominikschutz6300]

For corroded solder removing corrosion with a fiber glass pen and adding flux works best :)

[@Fredy5100]

You mentioned Mr. Carlson... :) And just like you, he has an amazing channel with some very, VERY awesome videos. Love your work!

[@beefgoat80]

I love your use of 'whom'

[@mspenrice]

*Video starts in what looks like someone's lounge* Oh hey that's all nice and homely--- *Camera pans across to huge workshop* ...ok, that's not a normal house layout ... :D Too bad those Xerox drives don't work... I really like those candy-coloured cuboid sugar-lump status lights on the front of them. They look very Tron. The most regular of those test patterns on the Sperry terminal seem oddly familiar. I think I've seen it somewhere before, and it was captioned as being a normal POST screen for some kind of semi-intelligent terminal. But without either information piping in from the mainframe, or additional code loaded from ROM or disk, that's all you were meant to get. Possibly that particular one was not actually set up to work independently and needs to be hooked up to a host over serial to display anything at all, and all you can otherwise get are basic self-check and CRT calibration patterns?

[@MrGTO-ze7vb]

YIKES.... that stuff is so old .. I worked at Sperry Univac building 14" disk drives in San Jose.. CA

[@orbitingeyes2540]

Wow, this brings back "memories". I used to rework those Sperry monitors at Unisys USPRO in the late 80s. The team in the video shop was the world's best bunch of practical jokers! Freeze-missiles away!

[@gotj]

Very green. Very green and that's ok. :-)

[@marktubes3419]

I don't know why but I love the fact you don't say zed 80.

[@nickblackburn1903]

Great video guys. Where can I find a keyboard for a Sperry UTS 20?

[@MattTester]

I notice that you have the exact same heat gun as me, how are you finding it? I have recently had problems with mine not detecting I have lifted it from the magnetic base and have to give it a whack, as you do with all good electronics.

[@pcuser80]

On the Sperry you see random data in videoram, the Z80 is stuck somewhere.

[@CuriousMarc]

Yes, most likely.

[@DAVIDGREGORYKERR]

I think that you can get various SCSI2SATA adaptors one of which should match the connector on the Alto and let you use a 100TB data-centre SSD.

[@BlackEpyon]

I had to Google it, but sure enough... Can't imagine how much it costs though. a 3.8TB SSD can easily exceed $10k

[@edgeeffect]

I didn't know anyone said "bollocks" outside of the UK. I like the look of those electric desolder pumps though... if they work.

[@fostercathead]

3:29 Lol! Only the best for us.

[@160rpm]

Cut off those damn batteries!!!

[@MVVblog]

Vino italiano di Modena, non sapevo che si potessero pulire i circuiti col vino :-)

[@ciano5475]

è aceto bianco, ma non so se sia veramente di Modena. :-) Si usa l'acido acetico per neutralizzare l'elettrolita alcalino uscito dalla batteria.

[@mr.nobody6829]

Why old computers have battery designed that way, it's virtually intalling a time bomb on the PCB.

[@Damien.D]

There is worst. Read about Capcom CPS2 arcade system and their suicide battery anti piracy protection... That thing is a self-destructing design!

[@BlackEpyon]

I've been hearing pretty good things about Kakko irons.

[@Wizardofgosz]

I've got a Hakko FX888d and it's an awesome iron. Maybe I'll have to grab that desoldering iron, too.

[@BlackEpyon]

Mine's just a Nexxtech 60w variable wattage. Had to order new tips from China, cause Source doesn't actually sell them. They don't sell much electronic components at all these days... I miss the old Radio Shack.

[@edgeeffect]

Those little aluminium desolder pumps aren't really that good... I've tried a few and they "try" to do a good job but aren't quite good enough... I can't afford a Hakko desoldering pump but I got hold of a "Soldapult" from Reichelt (whilst I'm still able to get stuff from Germany) and it's been fantastic. It's made a huge difference to my desoldering and would recommend them to anyone who, like me, is on a tight budget.

[@Membrane556]

Those PCB mounted nicad batteries are the bane of vintage computing. I had one completely destroy a memory board for an Amiga and a couple of old PC motherboards.

[@msylvain59]

I believe it is not a diode, but a SMD ceramic capacitor in a glass package with legs.

[@ShainAndrews]

LOL

[@station240]

Agreed, its a SMD ceramic cap in a glass casing, I've got 15 of them removed from 80's mainframe PCBs. Those blue monolithic capacitors used as bypass caps also contain SMD ceramic capacitors. Taken a long time for SMD soldering to catch up with the parts.

[@otherunicorn]

Not so sure about it being SMD, even though it looks similar. I have many caps in this format, and the chips inside do not seem to conform to any SMD standard.

[@frankie9259]

Keep the shows coming dont make us wait so long

[@Maskddingo]

"It beeps, it makes sounds, and it's green."

[@notfirefox599]

Marc, you have a very big house.

[@rjones8508]

Marc, any idea what is the relationship between the Diablo and DEC RK05? I have two RK05's not powered since about 1990 (alongside it's 1134a) that look very similar. The Diablo looks a bit thinner but I may be wrong.

[@CuriousMarc]

I don't know for sure. I would have to ask Lyle. But our orange drive seriously looks like a DEC-colored drive (Carl had to modify it for Alto use), and reading the Diablo wiki tells me DEC first shipped Diablos, then became a licensee and made their own.

[@carlclaunch793]

IBM invented the 14" single platter cartridge drive in San Jose, first shipping it in the IBM 1130 computer and then as the 2310 disk drive which could be attached to 1130, 1800 and 360 computers of the 1960s. The cartridge is named a 2315, by the way. The design was licensed by many vendors who produced compatible drives that all used the 2315 physical drives. The 2310 drive is called the 'standard density' type, writing at roughly 1000 bits per inch, while the other vendors quickly moved to 'high density' or double the rate per inch. The standard density used stainless steel heads with coils wound on iron cores, same as were used on the 1311 and 2311 drives which stacked multiple 14" platters on a 2316 disk pack. The 2314 disk drive increased density by using ceramic heads with ferrite cores in the coils - that technology was applied to single platter 2315 cartridges by other vendors to produce the high density models. The RK05 and Diablo are physically compatible with the 2310, all using the same 14" 2315 platters. The main difference was in the sector marks notched under the cartridge. The 2310 originally had 8 notches or sectors around the circumference. Diablo, Dec, Pertec and other vendors who licensed the 2310 technology chose their own sector schemes - DEC used both 8 and 12 sectors for the RK05 depending on whether it was used with a PDP8 or PDP11. Alternate vendors continued to evolve the technology - the next step was to double the number of tracks per inch by improving the positioning accuracy of the heads. The 2310 was built with 203 tracks as were the original RK05 and Diablo and others, but models arrived with 406 track. Another step in the evolution by DEC, Pertec, Diablo and others was to add a second 14" platter on the same rotating spindle of the drive - a fixed platter - while retaining the single platter 2315 cartridge. This further boosted the capacity of the drives but added the complication that half the data was swapped with cartridge change while the other half of the data stayed with the physical drive. HP, unlike the other vendors who licensed the ramkit (2310) technology, began to alter the actual platter inside the cartridge. HP drives had different thicknesses, so that a 2315 cartridge could NOT be used in their drives.

[@rjones8508]

Thanks, Carl! I suspected there was a story here. Now wondering if Marc's Alto has the 8 or 12 sector cartridges. Mine must be 12. 5 MB seemed like so much storage in the day. Especially removable.

[@wlanman99]

I operated a UTS-40 for many years in the 80's. Thanks to them I wear glasses now:) The amount of radiation they produced was considered "Unhealthy" by today's standards. It would be cool to have one at home to go with my Sperry 1100 disk platter.

[@BlakeGJ]

Not fixed, but it was all about the journey.

[@zvpunry1971]

The first thing I had done would be snipping off the leads of the evil nickel cadmium cell and throwing it into the hazardous waste bucket. And debugging comes before cleanup, the ugliness of the corroded components show where possible problems may hide. I once tried to repair a friends old 386 machine where the corrosive stuff went under the solder resist and crawled up and to the sides, eating away on the traces getting visible at component leads / solder pads. Maybe the disk drive is haunted by the ghosts of dead NiCd cells. This would explain why a cable on the other drive became lose when it was sitting next to the haunted one, it was corroded off by leaky NiCd-ghosts. =)

[@typograf62]

I think that I have used that type of Univac terminal in school, studying to be a programmer. Then that must have been around 1985-86 in Aarhus. It was odd. The Return key did not send anything, it just moved the cursor to the next line. To send anything you had to press the XMIT buttton. Then it transmitted the text between the SOE (start of entry) and the cursor. The SOE being closest to the cursor. So if you just corrected someting and forgot to move the cursor to the end of the line you lost a part of that line. If you removed the SOEs you could transmit several lines. The SOE was a triangle.

[@maxheadrom3088]

If you want to get me an Alto ... I'll be your friend forever! XD Nice video!

[@TheInfern0s]

Still an awesome video ! keep working !

[@zh84]

2:15 Now we have to find out if someone can trace Gloria!

[@douro20]

Was Dominique going to use hers to run CP/M?

[@CuriousMarc]

Yes, that's the plan and why he is so interested in this particular terminal.

[@dredscallon]

Yes, I am trying (I'm Dominique) to restart for years an UTS 40 with a 8406 double-sided diskette subsystem. I used this machine under CP/M a long time ago, this massive desktop machine has a sentimental value. www.zeltrax.com/classiccmp_forum/2.jpg But well ... the acid from the battery on these military-made triple layered board without schematics ... I have not managed to fix it yet, but I don't give up ;-)

[@gordonmacqueen8694]

And here I thought, when an old Sperry broke, that you'd get Russians exercising. I guess Jumpin' Jack Flash just wasn't very accurate in its portrayal of computers.

[@electronash]

I need to watch that again soon. Sperry computers always remind me of that movie too. :p I did watch it about five years ago, and remember it not ageing well, but still fun. I guess we were more easily entertained in the 80s. lol

[@Sys-Edit0r-1995]

If it's a Diablo drive isn't it possessed then?

[@srfrg9707]

Miel d'apiculteur... miam!

[@eekmeout]

that line was almost out of a sci-fi horror movie, “maybe it’s improving itself.”

[@Nexfero]

As for repairing broken tracing on circuit boards, I've had good luck with conductive ink pens especially if the trace is on a flat flex cable or unconventional PCB.

[@fnordhorn]

That drive from the disk cartage looks like a DEC RK05

[@525Lines]

As an ebay seller, please be kind about packaging. You can only do so much and make it cheap enough for a buyer. If you had just asked them for the boards they probably would have been happy to take out the boards and sell them separately. I take stuff apart and sell the parts all the time.

[@accordingtohonda4308]

nerds!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@A10Aful]

A Waste of time. KKKKKKKKK