🚀 go-pugleaf

In <kbJ5ltW00VI8JCZLEW@andrew.cmu.edu> dd26+@andrew.cmu.edu
  (Douglas F. DeJulio) writes:

>I was at a recent "garage sale" type hardware sale, and I picked up a
>Tektronix 4404 workstation for parts.  Can anyone tell me what I've
>got?  I know nothing about the system, and the CPU doesn't have a
>power supply so I can't power it up and figure things out.  They tell
>me that this thing runs Unix.  It has a 40 meg hard drive, and a nifty
>little card that makes a 5" floppy appear to be a SCSI device.  If
>nothing else, I'd like to figure out how to use that card (it'd be
>neat for my NeXT to read 5" DOS floppies).  It also has a three button
>mouse, and a very strange keyboard with some sort of 2-d pointing
>device built into it (not quite a track ball, but similar).


***  Note:  I don't speak for Tektronix.  For that matter, I don't speak for
     anyone except myself.  Also, Beware --  Tektronix has bailed out of the
     workstation market, so don't expect any support from Tek on this. ***

Well, the 4404 does NOT run Unix.  It runs "Uniflex" a (sort-of) Unix clone.
The keyboard is the same keyboard that is on several Tektronix graphics
terminals (with 2 different keycaps).  There was an upgrade available to
upgrade this to a 4405+ (or 4315-type) box.  It consisted of ripping all of the
old boards out and installing new ones. :-)

One nice thing that the 4404 has is a sharp monochrome display that runs
Smalltalk.  There's also a single RS232 port and parallel port.  The "display"
box contains the monitor (70hz, I think...?), the compute board, and the IO
board.  There can also be optional memory boards and a lan interface.
The box with the hard disk is called a "MSU", or Mass Storage Unit.
You're right -- The interface between the display unit and MSU is SCSI.
There's also an Adaptec 4000A SCSI <=> ST506 adapter.  The HD will work in
a PC class machine also.

I've known a few people that take the Adaptec board, HD, power supply, and
case, and add a Atari host adapter and make an Atari HD out of it.  Works
fairly well for that also.  There's room for 2 full-height hard drives.

The funny pointing device is called a "joydisk".  Think of it as the arrow's on
a PC keyboard.  If you want to go up, press the top, etc...

I think that the mouse is a Logitech 3 button "buss" mouse.  I don't have the
details on it, but I might be able to dig them up...

Also, the box has a fairly nifty 3 voice sound chip, plus a noise generator.

The floppy does go thru a SCSI <=> Floppy converter.  I know next to nothing
about how this works, but I might be able to find out.

Which power supply is missing?  If it's the one in the MSU, then a "PC" type
power supply should probably work...  Everything in there (except the fan :-)
runs off of either +12, or +5.

Hope this helps a little.  The 4404/4405's were last sold around 1987.

	-Jeff
-- 
Jeff Beadles		jeff@onion.pdx.com