Rescued: HP85, HP86B, 912x drives - score!

[Joe R.]

Ed,

  That's a NICE haul! The HP 9122 suffers from the usual HP double sided
drive problem of the mechanism sticking and not lifting the top head
suffiently to get the disk in and out without damaging the head. Definitely
check it before trying to install or remove a disk or you'll most likely
ruin the drive. See the archives for more info on this. The 9121s are good
rugged, reliable drives but I would clean the heads before trying to use
them. The HP-85s have the usual HP tape drive problem, gooy drive rollers.
Again, see the archives. Other than that they're almost rock solid, very
reliable machines. They DO support the HP 9121 drives so I advise using
those and forgetting the tape drives. I'm not sure but I don't think the
HP-86s uses NTSC video. They do work with the HP 82912 and 82913 monitors.

   Joe


At 12:16 AM 5/27/05 +0100, you wrote:
>Hi list,
>
>I pulled the following from a skip (or dumpster as you North Americans
>would have it!):
>
>http://img163.echo.cx/my.php?image=hp854qg.jpg (5 x HP85 computers)
>http://img263.echo.cx/my.php?image=hp86b4wy.jpg (3 x HP86B computers)
>http://img263.echo.cx/my.php?image=hpdrives8zh.jpg (5 x HP9121 dual
>drives, 1 x HP9122 dual drive)
>
>Is there anything specific to these machines I should check (aside
>from the obligatory stuff-from-a-dumpster drying-out period) before
>trying to power them on? I haven't got a monitor that will do the NTSC
>composite from the HP86Bs at the moment so I can't really try those,
>but I can try the HP85s and the drives if it's OK to.
>
>Thanks,
>
>Ed.
>
>