DIYbanter - View Single Post - Do you use any computer based tool for doing project layout?

Morris Dovey

On 4/11/2010 11:02 PM, zzzzzzzzzz wrote:
On Sun, 11 Apr 2010 00:26:41 -0500, Morris wrote:

You might get a kick out of learning that the floppy disk was originally
developed to load the microcode into the ill-fated object-based FS (for
Future System) machines.

Nah, floppies were used on the 370/158s to load microcode, well before FS.

Are you sure? The 158 was announced in August 2, 1972 about the time
Dept 71J in East Fishkill received a bare (no electronics) /Igar/ drive
from Boulder, and at that time the folks at Boulder were still having
difficulties producing diskettes (something about the jacket lining
abrading the oxide).

In 1972, D/71J was working on the UC0 and UC.5 controllers and firmware
drivers for not only /Igar/, but also for /Gulliver/ (the new sealed
hard drive from Hursley), /Lynx/ (a new band printer to succeed the
print-chain 1403), and an SDLC adapter - and all of these were being
developed (primarily) as building blocks for FS.

It was the guy across the hall from me who came up with the
motor+geneva+leadscrew drive to implement seeks (clack, clack, clack) on
/Igar/, which was later replaced with a (quiet) voice coil seek mechanism.

They all underwent final product test at the same time in Kingston
during, IIRC, 1974. We worked 12 hours on and twelve hours off with a
long commute, through that entire 6-week test process - it was an
exhausting experience (I remember waking up one morning on the way back
from Kingston - driving down the shoulder of US9 doing 65).

The evolved /Igar/ drive graduated as the 33FD. I still have some of the
diskettes.

--
Morris Dovey
DeSoto Solar
DeSoto, Iowa USA
http://www.iedu.com/DeSoto/