|
|
|
|
| Welcome, Guest | Home | Search | Login | Register | |
| Author | An orphaned oldie: IOTech “MacSCSI 488” (Read 7068 times) | ||||||||||||||
|
gsteemso
8 MB  Posts: 10 
|
on: July 17, 2009, 00:09
This is a device for interfacing Macs to IEEE-488 (GPIB) devices. I bought it so I could hook my Commodore PET to my Classic II. :¬) It was a bargain at $20, considering the original price in 1988 was ~$800! The only trouble is, it’s SO old no one seems to have drivers or documentation for it. Even if someone did find drivers, I don’t know as they’d work under 7.6.1 (or, for that matter, under System 7 at all!), unless IOTech issued updates. IOTech’s Support department doesn’t have anything even half that old. At this point I’m assuming I’ll have to write my own software. Not a big deal, considering the PET and its drives would need custom programming anyway, but it would be a lot easier with documentation. Anyone got pointers for me? |
||||||||||||||
|
wove
|
1024 MB Posts: 1363
Reply #1 on: July 17, 2009, 02:03
|
My first computer was a CBM 8032 with an 8250 drive connected via the IEEE-488 interface. Old HP CP/M computers used the same interface. Sounds like an interesting device. It sounds like it is a SCSI to IEEE-488 converter and would be used to connect to the old IEEE-488 devices and not to the IEEE-488 interface on another computer. I suppose a Mac laptop in SCSI disk mode could then be seen and read from a CBM machine. And of course if it is just an interface then you could connect a CBM machine to an external Mac SCSI device. If you are trying to connect your Mac to your PET you can connect via a null modem cable. Using terminal applications you can then exchange files between the two. If it follows the standard IEEE-488 interface then you can access it using the built in BASIC on the PET. I can probably dig out old information relating to the PET side, but have no idea where to start on the Mac. What IEEE-488 peripherals do you have for your PET? bill
|
gsteemso
|
8 MB Posts: 10
Reply #2 on: July 25, 2009, 00:11
|
For GPIB devices, all I have is a MSD-1 single floppy drive (and, of course, my "Fat 40" PET 4032 itself). As far as I know the MacSCSI 488 is designed solely for use by a controlling program on the SCSI side, but I will of course be experimenting with it to see how far I can bend that rule. My main idea is to use the MacSCSI 488 to control the MSD-1, with the goal of reading and writing Commodore floppies to and from disk images on the Mac. (Direct communication betwixt Mac and PET would be cool; but not, alas, very useful.) Since the Mac (a Classic II with 10MB/500MB/OS 7.6.1) is networked, I will suddenly have a way to get Internet disk images to my Commodore machines (the PET, and a "flat" C128 with some upgrades).
|
wove
|
1024 MB Posts: 1363
Reply #3 on: July 25, 2009, 15:47
|
Always nice to hear about Commodore Machines, they were my first computers. The MSD drives were expensive relative to the Commodore drives and have an excellent reputation for reliability. They connect both to the PET series of machine via IEEE-488 and to the C=64, C=128 machines. I transfered all my old C= documents to the new Mac SE using a null modem cable from the C= user port to the SE serial port. I used GeoTerm on the Commodore and the communication module of ClarisWorks. I was only concerned about getting documents to my new platform, but the setup could have been used to transfer items from the SE back to the Commodore as well. This contains very comprehensive information about exchanging information between Commodore Computers and a variety of other platforms including the Mac. bill
|
|
Pages: [1]
|
| ||||
|
© 2021 System7Today.com. |
