I picked up a surplus MVME rack, stuffed with motorola VME boards that I'm having difficulty identifying, Doing a web search shows these cards in various seller's inventories, but I haven't yet found anything that tells me what these cards actually ARE - I can lookm at the cards and make a general presumption of what it's for, but where do I get the full data ?
Is there a good resource for doing this type of 'catalog' research ?
What I have is:
MVME 187B (Okay, I figured out this is an 88K CPU card) MVME 323 MVME 350 MVME 712A/AM (ser/par/ethernet interface board for the 187B ?) MVME 705A (6 serial ports ?) MVME 332 "Transition BD." (8 Serial ports?) MVME 707 (2 serial ports and a 50-pin header) MVME 823 (SCSI Hard disk and QIC tape drive)
All this in a double-side box (Motorola ? No label.) with a fairly hefty power supply
My objective is a simple system for playing around with a BSD (FreeBSD, NetBSD, etc). I'm presuming that the bare minimum I need is the 187B for a CPU; 712A for a console interface; and the 823 for storage ?
I played around with VME a bit in the early '90s, mostly XyCom and Texas Instruments equipment for industrial process control; I wouldn't begin to call myself an expert - Any advice to a semi-newbie would be appreciated.
You could try http://www.motorola.com/computer/literature although documentation is probably not available; these boards went EOL a _long_ time ago. From memory: MVME187B -- 88100 single board computer, 32MB MVME323 -- ESDI disk controller MVME350 -- QIC tape controller MVME332 -- 6 port serial MVME712 -- rear transition module for the MVME187 MVME705 -- rear transition module for the MVME332 MVME707 -- SCSI transition module; don't recall it having serial ports and it wouldn't normally go with any of the boards listed MVME823 -- disk/tape
>I picked up a surplus MVME rack, stuffed with motorola VME boards that > I'm having difficulty identifying, Doing a web search shows these cards > in various seller's inventories, but I haven't yet found anything that > tells me what these cards actually ARE - I can lookm at the cards and > make a general presumption of what it's for, but where do I get the full > data ?
> Is there a good resource for doing this type of 'catalog' research ?
> What I have is:
> MVME 187B (Okay, I figured out this is an 88K CPU card) > MVME 323 > MVME 350 > MVME 712A/AM (ser/par/ethernet interface board for the 187B ?) > MVME 705A (6 serial ports ?) > MVME 332 "Transition BD." (8 Serial ports?) > MVME 707 (2 serial ports and a 50-pin header) > MVME 823 (SCSI Hard disk and QIC tape drive)
> All this in a double-side box (Motorola ? No label.) with a fairly hefty > power supply
> My objective is a simple system for playing around with a BSD (FreeBSD, > NetBSD, etc). I'm presuming that the bare minimum I need is the 187B for > a CPU; 712A for a console interface; and the 823 for storage ?
> I played around with VME a bit in the early '90s, mostly XyCom and Texas > Instruments equipment for industrial process control; I wouldn't begin > to call myself an expert - Any advice to a semi-newbie would be > appreciated.
> You could try http://www.motorola.com/computer/literature although > documentation is probably not available; these boards went EOL a > _long_ time ago. From memory: > MVME187B -- 88100 single board computer, 32MB > MVME323 -- ESDI disk controller > MVME350 -- QIC tape controller > MVME332 -- 6 port serial > MVME712 -- rear transition module for the MVME187 > MVME705 -- rear transition module for the MVME332 > MVME707 -- SCSI transition module; don't recall it having serial ports > and it wouldn't normally go with any of the boards listed > MVME823 -- disk/tape
> how many slots in the chassis?
> Regards
I forget the terminology for describing the slots in the chassis, haven't seen a VME system in years.
It's a 19" rackmount chassis. Motorola sticker on the side of the chassis has the numbers 01-W1323B01 and 100003-11X, if that means anything.
Anyway, the front of the chassis has, starting from the left, a double row of 4 (single-height?) spaces, one of which is the power switch and + 5/+12/-12 LEDs; 9 (Full-height) slots with the backplane; space for the MVME823 disk/tape drive.
The rear of the chassis has a (triple-width?) panel with circuit breaker, then room for mounting 15 or so single-with full-height modules but no backplane.
The whole thing is mounted in a Schroff "portable" cabinet with a 1U fan set underneath, as if this might have been a portable demo unit.
A decal on front of the fan panel calls it "VME System 1000", but this may or may not mean anything; it doesn't have the look of the original Motorola nameplates (Which were black/silver plastic, not decals, as I recall).
Fred It's a Motorola chassis, but one so old that it predates the Computer Group. Probably an 1121 system from the Microcomputer Division of SPS. Nevertheless, VME is VME and it'll work.
The smaller slots on the left are for 3U VME cards, MVME6xx series. Haven't seen those since the early 90's. The 187 should go in the leftmost 6U slot and the remainder in any order proceeding to the right (leave no empty slot). The 712M should have a small paddle card -- that will plug into the rear; same slot as the 187. The cable from the 705 plugs into the rear P2 of the bus in the same slot as the 332. Can't fully recall how the 323 and 350 connected to a disk and tape respectively. In any case all you'll really need for a system is the 187. It's got 4 serial, 1 parallel, SCSI, and ethernet. All that comes out to the 712M. Console is 9600 8N1 DTE. It should boot up into 88KBug. If you can't find a manual for that, use one for 68K (162, or 167) as the command structure was identical.
>> You could try http://www.motorola.com/computer/literature although >> documentation is probably not available; these boards went EOL a >> _long_ time ago. From memory: >> MVME187B -- 88100 single board computer, 32MB >> MVME323 -- ESDI disk controller >> MVME350 -- QIC tape controller >> MVME332 -- 6 port serial >> MVME712 -- rear transition module for the MVME187 >> MVME705 -- rear transition module for the MVME332 >> MVME707 -- SCSI transition module; don't recall it having serial ports >> and it wouldn't normally go with any of the boards listed >> MVME823 -- disk/tape
>> how many slots in the chassis?
>> Regards
> I forget the terminology for describing the slots in the chassis, > haven't seen a VME system in years.
> It's a 19" rackmount chassis. Motorola sticker on the side of the > chassis has the numbers 01-W1323B01 and 100003-11X, if that means > anything.
> Anyway, the front of the chassis has, starting from the left, a double > row of 4 (single-height?) spaces, one of which is the power switch and + > 5/+12/-12 LEDs; 9 (Full-height) slots with the backplane; space for the > MVME823 disk/tape drive.
> The rear of the chassis has a (triple-width?) panel with circuit > breaker, then room for mounting 15 or so single-with full-height modules > but no backplane.
> The whole thing is mounted in a Schroff "portable" cabinet with a 1U fan > set underneath, as if this might have been a portable demo unit.
> A decal on front of the fan panel calls it "VME System 1000", but this > may or may not mean anything; it doesn't have the look of the original > Motorola nameplates (Which were black/silver plastic, not decals, as I > recall).
I picked up this system surplus back in March, as indicated by the thread below.
Since then, looking around at the general shape of the VME world, since I don't fit any of the niche categories (Aerospace, etc) that still use VME, I've concluded that the only thing more pointless for me than learning about VME is learning the M88K processor on the 187 board.
Anybody want this stuff ? I'm keeping the Schroff Cabinet, but the rack and everything else is up for grabs.
All I'm asking for it is the cost of shipping it to wherever. Shipping would be from Portland Oregon 97006.
> Fred > It's a Motorola chassis, but one so old that it predates the Computer > Group. Probably an 1121 system from the Microcomputer Division of SPS. > Nevertheless, VME is VME and it'll work.
> The smaller slots on the left are for 3U VME cards, MVME6xx series. > Haven't seen those since the early 90's. The 187 should go in the > leftmost 6U slot and the remainder in any order proceeding to the > right (leave no empty slot). The 712M should have a small paddle card > -- that will plug into the rear; same slot as the 187. The cable from > the 705 plugs into the rear P2 of the bus in the same slot as the 332. > Can't fully recall how the 323 and 350 connected to a disk and tape > respectively. In any case all you'll really need for a system is the > 187. It's got 4 serial, 1 parallel, SCSI, and ethernet. All that > comes out to the 712M. Console is 9600 8N1 DTE. It should boot up > into 88KBug. If you can't find a manual for that, use one for 68K > (162, or 167) as the command structure was identical.
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