[SunRescue] Need a system to learn on...

[BSD Bob]

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> >If you want iron to get yer gemittenfingerpokins into, then a 12 slot
> >deskside VME crate of the sun3 or sun4 line is a classical gas.
> >Bear in mind that you will have substantial nuances to overcome in
> >order to make a good workhorse machine out of it (such as old tape
> >drives with decomposing rubber wheels, old HD's that are getting
> >harder to find, incompatibility issues between hardware levels, porting
> >sufficient software to suit, finding documentation  for it, etc.).
> >Also, finding working monitors of that vintage is getting difficult.
> >Most of what I have run across in surplus are dead or dying things.
> >Basically, I would not recommend one as a learning machine on which
> >to learn how to operate a unix box.  If you want a good, solid box
> >to tinker with, and are prepared to tinker, they are fine.
> 
>     Wait a minute... you're having trouble finding such gear?  Erk, 
> how do I say this and retain respect for the gear... hmmm...

Actually, yes, in my central NC area.  I have pretty well exhausted
all the surplus haunts, the computer geeks, friends, and that kind of
thing.  There is a lot of sparc stuff around but not so much sun3 stuff.

In my experiences, I would hesitate to recommend a sun3 unless one were
really going to get into the beast, and be prepared to do that.

Remember, he was wanting a learning machine for his dad.  The sun3 really
isn't a beginner's learning box, unless one has all the manuals, lots
of spares, and lots of patience.  They are fun machines, with some effort,
but not really a learner's box.  They are more of the garage tinkerer's box.
They are rugged and reliable, aside from aging tape drives and fading
MFM/ESDI drives.   You can put scsi drives in, but they can be a real
dastardly problem to format and label, because the stats in the format.dat
file floating around the net are mostly wrong, for sun3 machines.  They
just don't work.  You can figure out, by grunt and numerous tries what may
be a workable format to use, assuming certain things about drive layouts
reserved tracks, etc.  That is not obvious to the learner type, and
frustrating at best.  If you lose that tape drive, then you are kindof
stuck.  Almost every one of my tape drives are belly-up due to decomposing
rubber drive wheels.  To the newbie, it just give tape read errors and
he won't easily know why, unless he really dives inside the tape drive.

Speaking of the tape drives, I did finally work up what seems to be
a reasonable fix for the Wantek tape drives with melted drive wheels.
Drop by your friendly medical supply store and look for 5/16 or 3/8
inch surgical rubber hose.  Remove the drive belt, and the circlip
and the thrust washers from the drive wheel, and carefully lift out
the drive wheel.  Using isopropyl rubbing alcohol, dissolve away the
remaing decomposed rubber drive wheel goo.  Clean the brass drive wheel
bushing.  Cut a replacement band of about 1/4 inch width from the surgical
rubber tubing, and superglue in place on the drive wheel.   Trim to fit
with a razor blade.  Reinstall  the  drive wheel, thrust washers and
circlip.  Reinstall the tape drive.  (Note:  IFF you lose that circlip,
you are S.O.L., they are almost unobtainium in that small size.  Never
fear, you can just cut about 1/3 of the thrust tension spring off with
diagonal cutting pliers, until the drive wheel sits flush with the top
frame, and you don't even need the circlip or thrust washers.)  Works
fine for me so far.  If you are not prepared to tinker to that extent,
the average beginner unix type will give up in frustration since his
tape drive will not read tapes.  To date, I have not found replacement
hose or tubing that will work on the Archive tape drives.... drat!
The drive bushing is too small for most tubing thicknesses.

>     "Please... I will do anything... I've got all of it... *BUY IT*".
> How was that?  =)

Well, what ya got?  My basic needs are spare 4M Carrera ram boards,
spare tape drives, although I got that mostly fixed, now, spare
Micropolis 1558 ESDI drives (proper for the old boxes), ram simms
to upgrade my 4/110 from 256K to 1M simms, Fortran tape for SunOS 4.1.1,
and some mono monitors (although those would be disaster to ship, and
probably would be local uhaulit only).

>     No, really, if anyone is having trouble finding such gear, I'd be 
> more than glad to sell it to them for quite little.

Maybe you might put together a list of what you have and pass it around.
Biz off the list via one-on-one email, but a list of what you have might
be of use to folks.

>                                     -Kent Rankin

Bob