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DC62/Pertec cable?

ajrendall

New Member
Joined
Nov 23, 2007
Messages
2
Hello there,

I'm new to these forums, so please excuse any etiquette blunders I may make.

I've recently started a new job and one of my first tasks is to identify and attempt to re-use and old tape drive that's been lying around the office for many years. It's a Cipher M990 unit (as far as I can tell) with model number M990110-00-0100U.

However the big question is, what type of interface does it have? The cable coming out of the back is attached to two 50? pin edge connectors and ends in a DC62 male plug (3 x 21 pins). I can't find an interface board for this in the pile of old boards lying around, so all I can guess is that it's a proprietary SCSI or Pertec interface.

Has anyone seen one of these types of interface and can you help me identify it?

Thanks in advance for any help you can give.

Andrew.
 
According to the Internet, the Cipher M990 uses a proprietry Pertec interface.

See http://www.lacey.cc/seismic_faq.html Site indicates that there was an ISA card ("Microtech Pertec T816C ISA Card Interface") that could drive the Pertec tape drives. The site sells DOS software for that card.

At http://www.avax.com/avaxprot.html (and other sites), a PERTEC to SCSI converter is available.

Site http://www.electrovalueinc.com/9_track_drives.htm advertises a complete M990 drive/controller/software package. Maybe they would sell just the 8 bit controller and software.
 
I should have added: If the purpose of your task is to recover information on an old tape, note that you may need to source the exact software used to write the data to the tape. That in turn may restrict the hardware you can use.
 
Brilliant!

Thanks for the help. I've had to re-comission some fairly old stuff in the past, but not quite this old. I took a look at a couple of this sites you mentioned above last week and though they may be useful. It's nice to know that I have been looking in the right place.

If we think we can get it working then we'll probably end up looking at the software and hardware package that's on the site you mentioned. As for getting the data off it, we may end up writing our own code just to extract the data.

My next task is to actually power the beast up and see if it hums or goes bang! Wish me luck. :)

Thanks again.

A.
 
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