[SunRescue] come closer and let me pick your brain.

[Maarten Deen]

Alan Robinson:

> > 3. I got a case of unknown sparc type. It has the strangest SCSI
> > connector on the back. Labeled as a sparc 511 case. What is/was this for?
> > Has a scsi 50 pin cable inside. Beyond that I am at a loss and figure stuff
> > is missing out of it, but for $1 how wrong could I go?

For a buck it's ok.
 
> I picked up a 511 case at a hamfest a few months ago. It housed a QIC tape
> drive (QIC-24 I believe), controller card and power supply. The connecter on
> the back is an old-style (3 row) 50 pin SCSI connector. The case was
> manufactured in 1989. I removed the QIC drive and used it to house a 4mm DAT
> drive and a CD-ROM. One note of caution -  the regulators on the power supply
> run very hot. They are bolted to the bottom of the case and the metal
> underneath can also get very hot. Be careful what you put under it.

This prompted me to look. This is the ominous (as I know it) shoebox that 
came with sun3 systems. I have one with a 5 1/4" full height 80Mb (don't 
panic) Micropolis disk in it. Alas it won't spin up properly. It spins, but 
wobbles in speed under its maximum speed.
Oh, it also houses the SCSI-ESDI interface card to make the Micropolis talk 
SCSI.

Nice beasts, and if you are willing to make some provisional racking inside, it 
will house a lot of disks. Fans are loud, powersupply is old an fixable for even 
the less knowledgable. Surfacemount? What's that?

Maarten
--
Maarten Deen                                           +31 (0)77 3076879
mdeen at xs4all.nl                              http://www.xs4all.nl/~mdeen