[pups] AVIV vs. DigiData tape controller

[Carl Lowenstein]

> Date: Wed, 14 Mar 2001 09:28:41 -0500 (EST)
> From: "Gregory R. Travis" <greg at ciswired.com>
> To: pups at minnie.cs.adfa.edu.au
> Subject: [pups] AVIV vs. DigiData tape controller
> 
> It appears to support Pertec formatted tape drives.  It has two
> cable interfaces, labeled Pertec P1 and Pertec P2.
> 
> I currently have a DigiData Pertec formatted 9-track drive plugged into a
> DigiData controller on my QBUS 11/83.  Works fine.   Now I'd like to use
> the drive to bootstrap the 11/44.
> 
> The DigiData drive's cables are both 49-pin ribbons.  Sure enough,
> the DigiData controller's cable headers are also 49-pin (what a wonderful
> world, eh?)
> However, the AVIV controller's cable headers are 59-pin!

Are you sure those numbers aren't 50 and 60, respectively?

> Anyone have any insight into what's going on here?  Isn't a Pertec
> interface a Pertec interface?  Or is the DigiData using some kind of
> proprietary (to DigiData) interface?

For what it's worth, there were two distinctly different "Pertec"
interfaces.  They might be called Early Pertec and Late Pertec.
For Early Pertec, the eventual cable breakout to the drives went
to three connectors, Read data, Write data, and Control.  Possibly
the AVIV controller was meant to be used with a custom cable set
to match a "three-connector" drive.

    carl

        carl lowenstein         marine physical lab     u.c. san diego
                                                  clowenstein at ucsd.edu

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