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1. philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:42 JST philpem

   A little finishing work on the #AnalogCable ANIC tonight. Turns out General Instrument tapped the base screws for UNC 4-40 screws, but left the side screw holes untapped. These are going to be taking M3 screws.

   • Foone🏳️‍⚧️ (foone@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:30 JST Foone🏳️‍⚧️

     in reply to

     @philpem nice bright yellow phosphor

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:31 JST philpem

     in reply to

     The UI looks very nice on a text terminal. Wish I knew how to trigger the function keys. Oddly the help button just makes the terminal beep.

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:32 JST philpem

     in reply to

     Okay. I'm thinking I might try a different 3C509 card.
     And what the heck is "hdrops++"?

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:33 JST philpem

     in reply to

     Nope, still crashing. Argh.

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:34 JST philpem

     in reply to

     Hmm. Seems like the Etherlink card is upset.

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:34 JST philpem

     in reply to

     Upgraded Interactive UNIX to version 4.1.1 and the issue became immediately obvious: it was running out of STREAMS queues. On 4.1+4.1a this seems to cause kernel memory corruption and eventually a TCP/IP stack crash.
     On 4.1.1 the kernel barks loudly about the problem on the system console. A quick kernel tweak to increase NQUEUE to 1600 and we're golden.
     Did some spit and polish on the window arrangement too, now the Wirelink windows look sensible.

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:35 JST philpem

     in reply to

     Ugh. The headend runs for a while then crashes with a network error :(

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:36 JST philpem

     in reply to

     My current #analogcable wants list...

     - a later version of the ACC-4000 software (DEC Prioris or Proliant server running SCO OSE)
     - documentation, especially the Wirelink protocol spec

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:37 JST philpem

     in reply to

     And now I know the upstream frequency range - 8.3 to 10.4 MHz. No idea about the spacing but the config file says 100kHz steps.

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:37 JST philpem

     in reply to

     Darn. Software is too old to support the international version of the CFT2000 and CFT2100 boxes :(
     Good news is it supports the US CFT2000 and International DP7000, so (at least in theory) I can use the iDP mode to figure out frequency maps, and the US CFT2000 mode to figure out barker messages and OSDs.

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:38 JST philpem

     in reply to

     I had some concerns about the scrambler - it seemed to have quite old firmware. Turns out it's working fine though!

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:39 JST philpem

     in reply to

     Hands up if you have a cable TV headend in your living room #AnalogCable

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:40 JST philpem

     in reply to

     Sadly both of the HP DAT8i drives I picked up - including the new in box one - were dead. I've swapped back to the rough-looking but at least working Seagate/Archive drive (it's either a Python or a Peregrine flashed with audio firmware).
     I don't really need it, but it's nice to have. I also have a HP DAT72 in SCSI, which is a tempting upgrade option - except it's got a black panel, so it'll make this machine look a bit odd

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:41 JST philpem

     in reply to

     Topboard jumpers, just in case I knock one off by accident...

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 12:30:41 JST philpem

     in reply to

     Aside from fitting the right angle F connectors and moving the ANIC back a bit, I think this is pretty much done. I'm hoping that the tape drive works, it'll be a pig to replace if it doesn't.

   • philpem (philpem@digipres.club)'s status on Thursday, 07-Mar-2024 19:53:04 JST philpem

     in reply to

     • Foone🏳️‍⚧️

     @foone it's actually amber! My phone camera isn't picking it up very well