Convergent MiniFrame (Help)

[Thad P Floryan]

{Newsgroups: comp.sys.att}
{Subject: Convergent MiniFrame (Help)}

ejp at grout.HP.COM(Eric Porter) in <1990Jun13.235306.1062 at lsw!grout!ejp> writes:

	I recently aquired a convergent miniframe.
	...
	I am told the beast worked the last time it was turned on.  Unfortunatly
	the previous owner has removed the hard disk, the disk drive cables,
	and lost the O.S. disketts.
	...

The Miniframe is also known as (repackaged as) the Motorola 6300, and it's
logically the same as the AT&T UNIXPC (aka 3B1 aka PC7300 (which is also known
as Convergent's S50 box)).

Re:	1)  What do i need to cable the hard disk, and floppy disk?  Anything
	    strange (twists in the cable etc).  The motherboard has 4 connectors
	    (none seem to be marked) wich is for the hard drive/floppy ?

Look at the motherboard.  The edge having the connectors looks like so:

      +----[20-pin]----[20-pin]----[34-pin]----[34-pin]----------+
      |                                                          |
             (A)         (B)         (C)         (D)

(A) is the data bus to/from the second HD
(B) is the data bus to/from the first HD
(C) is the data/control bus for the floppy drive.  Standard pinouts; straight
    through to the floppy drive (which, by the way, is DS/QD with STANDARD
    media (not IBM-type hi-density); the PROPER floppy is, for example, a
    Verbatim DataLife 2S/4D, 80-track, 96TPI, quad-density, soft-sectored,
    with hub-ring, product code MD 557-01).    
(D) is the daisy-chainable control bus for the hard drives.  The ribbon cable
    simply goes to each HD in turn with the last HD being the only one with
    the resistor termination pack.  No funny twists are required assuming you
    know how to set the drive-select jumpers on each HD's logic/control PCB.

The HDs need to be MFM ST-506 with 17-sectors/track, with up to 16 heads and
1024 cylinders MAX.  If you swap the WD1010 for a WD2010 (which is a plugin
socketed swap), you can go beyond 1024 cylinders (like for a Maxtor XT2190).

Re:	2)  Can someone help my track down Unix, C, or Diagnostics? 
	(I would like to start with the diagnostics.)

Wellllll, you can run either the latest CTIX (from Convergent) or Motorola's
FE07 or FE08 software releases.  And you can run anything from the UNIXPC
that doesn't used the shared libraries; don't expect to run the 3B1's kernel
due to the weird formatting of the HD required for the "download area" for the
RS-422 console terminal.

I have a diagnostics disk that you're welcome to for the cost of mailing, but
I strongly urge you to contact Convergent (on First Street in San Jose, CA) to
see about getting a CTIX license and software for use on your system if you
wish to pursue the (arduous) task of bringing it up from scratch.  I do NOT
have CTIX nor am I familiar with that software product, but I'd be willing to
help you with any HARDWARE questions you have re-building your system since
it's otherwise identical to the Motorola 6300/6350.

Thad

Thad Floryan [ thad at cup.portal.com (OR) ..!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!thad ]