RGB-to-VGA adapter & docs was: Re: HP "Field Guide" ?

[Christian R. Fandt]

Upon the date 19:31 24-03-05, Joe R. said something like:

> >
>
> >anyway. The two fixed freq monitors specified for the 98547A are the HP
> >98751A (19") or HP 98785A (16").
>
>   I doubt the 98547 will work with your card.

The card *is* a 98547A. The 98751A and 98785A are the only two monitors 
listed in the '89 catalog (and mentioned on one or two online sources) as 
being compatible.


>   I have an old ADC VGA PC-type monitor that also has RGB inputs and it
>does sync up to some of the HP cards including the 98751 IIRC. All of the
>HP video cards have different scan rates and resolution so you just have to
>try them to see if they work with the VGA monitors. If you have any other
>HP video cards you could try one of them if the installed one doesn't work.
>
>    If you can't figure it out you could always send the drive to me and
>I'll hang it off of one of my systems. In fact I have a couple of HP
>9000/362s that I need to try out. They use VGA monitors and and PS-2
>keyboards.

I thought of having to do that if I had not found a way to drive a VGA 
monitor from the 98547A. That would help you extract the DOS Coprocessor 
software (and perhaps allow a drive image to be made for my backup).

> >
>
> >had been removed from some sort of military transit case. There's a US
> >government NSN number stenciled on the side of the CPU box. I'm going to
> >check with some of my military radio collector friends to see what it
> >translates to.
>
>    An NSN won't tell you much other than the country of origin and
>manufacturer. It won't tell you ANYTHING about the intended usage. Most
>(all?) of HP's stuff is already in the government supply system and has
>already been assigned NSNs and can be ordered off the shelf (pre-approved).
>A common item like a computer could go into ANYTHING. OTOH the military
>nomenclature may tell you a lot including what system it's a part of. There

I understand a little bit about the NSN nomenclature and its limitations in 
this case, but knowing the *system* from whence it came may let me find 
more documentation on LOGSA or elsewhere as to what it was used for (if its 
not still classified).


> >I found my HP/UX 5.5, BASIC/UX 5.5 and HP/UX 7.0 distro tapes, all still in
> >shrinkwrap and their licence certificates, that I had squirreled away for a
> >rainy day. I think Linux and one or two of the BSD's have been ported to
> >run on this system. Anybody have the HP Pascal 3.1 or 3.2 system?
>
>    I do. I also have several versions of BASIC and a couple of versions of
>HPL.


Ahhhh, yes, HPL. About 19-20 years ago I used to be nearly fluent in it on 
the HP9825. Lots of interesting stuff could be done with that machine and 
HPL if you put your mind to it. What type of media would that be on?


> >How about documents -user manuals, tech data, service manuals, etc.??
> >Anything at all around in paper or .pdf for any of this h/w? Nothing on
> >bitsavers.org. Anybody have HP 9000 websites?
>
>    There is a BSD website that describes a lot of the high end HP 9000/300
>hardware. Sorry but I don't have the URL any more. I have some stuff posted
>about the 9800 and 9000 200 series but litle about the 9000/300. I do have

I have to admit it had been at least 14 months since I did concentrated 
searching upon the Web for 9000/300 stuff. A few things floated to the 
surface yesterday as follows . . .

I just discovered this URL which has collated a bunch of info including 
some extracted from the HP 9000 Workstations Configuration Guide:
http://www.pacificsites.com/~brooke/HPIB.shtml .  BTW, this is the *first* 
time I ever saw mention of a 9000/332 workstation like I used to manage on 
a couple of really complex metrology machines at a previous workplace. They 
were used primarily as instrument controllers and data processing systems 
and probably were not thought of as being in the same league as the 320's, 
340', 350's, etc. HP's Workstation Pascal 3.2 and some assembler (for the 
critically timed data collection routines) were the languages my German 
engineering colleagues used to write the application. Got a copy or two of 
the application source code around the house somewhere.

This URL has some important info on the two monitors the 98547A RGB card 
drives:
http://mail-index.netbsd.org/port-hp300/1996/03/28/0004.html .

And this URL hits upon the subject matter of which we are discussing now:
http://www.hut.fi/Misc/Electronics/faq/vga2rgb/vgamonitor.html . This is in 
line with the same thinking I had and that Eric J. Korpela had described 
with regard to making an RGA-to-VGA adaptor box -although I hadn't gotten 
to thinking about that good old LM1881 sync separator chip yet.

All of those URLs did not come up directly from Googling on terms specific 
to their content but rather very indirectly after drilling down through 
two, three or four linking URLs found on previous pages in the searching. 
Takes a LOT of time hunting through webpages like had been done to stumble 
onto the above URLs, but it sure is rewarding occasionally like this has 
just been.


>a LOT of docs that include material about the 9000/300, HP-UX, HW
>configuration manuals, Pascal, HPL, BASIC and more.

Golly Joe, I wish paper like that could be scanned for Al's site which 
would be a great resource for other HP 9000/300 enthusiasts. Lots o' work 
of course, but I would volunteer to help if it ever came to pass. I need to 
get my scanner setup and learn how to create .pdf files from the scans. 
I've got other docs that I feel could be an important addition to 
bitsavers.org anyway.  I would especially like to find paper or .pdf copies 
of the HP 9000 *hardware* manuals and the Workstations Configuration Guide.

Regards,  Chris F.

NNNN


=======================================================
Christian R. Fandt, Treasurer
Antique Wireless Association, Inc.
31 Houston Avenue
Jamestown, New York     Phone: +716-488-1722
14701-2627   USA     email:  cfandt at netsync.net
                    Electronic/Electrical Historian
                    URL: http://www.antiquewireless.org/