[Simh] VMS 1.5 installable?

[Peter Allan]

Thanks to Wilm, I now have VMS 1.5 up and running. This is new territory
for me since my first exposure to VAXen was in late 1982 when the version
was something like 3.0, or just possibly the last version of 2.x. (I didn't
pay attention to such things back then. If I could write Fortran programs,
I was happy.)

However, the fact that I could complete the installation of VMS 3.0 by
using a simulated TS11 tape drive when it failed with a TE16 drive has got
me wondering if there is a bug in simh. Surely on a real system you could
use a real TS11 or TE16 drive? Obviously there is no density on a simulated
tape file, but is there any other difference between the two simulated tape
drives that explains what is going on?

Cheers

Peter Allan


On 25 October 2017 at 14:08, Peter Allan <petermallan at gmail.com> wrote:

> Thanks Wilm, I will try that out. I doubt I would have thought of using a
> TS11 rather than a TE16 without your advice.
>
> Peter
>
> On 25 October 2017 at 12:39, Wilm Boerhout <wboerhout at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Your approach is correct, I have regularly used it over the past weeks to
>> bring up VMS 1.0.
>>
>> I also saw these CRC errors on restore sometimes. There are two ways
>> around this:
>>
>> 1. Mount the 3.0 tape on a generic (newer) VAX/VMS system, use
>>    $MOUNT/OVER=ID and copy the LIBRARY and OPTIONAL savesets to a
>>    (RP06-sized) disk in the [0,0] directory. In a later step, $ mount
>>    /foreign this disk, and point the installer to this disk as the source.
>> 2. On your 3.0 system just booted with just the REQUIRED saveset, use a
>>    TS11 and not a TE16 tape unit in the simh config. Somehow this
>>    worked. Also, when you use a TE16, use an explicit $MOU/FOR
>>    /DEN=800. I forget in which version, but this also worked sometimes.
>>
>> HTH
>>
>> /Wilm
>>
>>
>> Peter Allan schreef op 25-10-2017 om 13:30:
>>
>>> Encouraged by all of the posting about running VMS 1.5 on an emulated
>>> VAX 780 with simh, I have tried to do the same. However, I am having a
>>> problem.
>>>
>>> I don't have an existing VMS 3.x system running (4.6 is my earliest), so
>>> I tried to do a VMS 3.0 installation using the tape from uni-stuttgart
>>> which I had downloaded some time ago.
>>>
>>> I booted a VMS 4.6 system on an emulated 780 and did an image restore
>>> using BACKUP of the REQUIRED saveset on the VMS 3.0 installation tape to an
>>> RP06. So far, so good. Then I booted the newly created RP06 disk, which
>>> continued the installation process by attempting to restore the LIBRARY
>>> saveset on the VMS 3.0 tape. However, this crashed with too many CRC errors.
>>>
>>> This is where I am stuck. I could download the tape from uni-stuttgart
>>> again, but is there any reason to expect a better result by doing this? Can
>>> someone who has got this to work advise me what to try next please. I have
>>> downloaded the files that Christian posted, but while that has standalone
>>> backup on a disk image, I need DSC to read the VMS 1.5 tape (don't I?)
>>> which is the only reason that I was trying to get VMS 3.0 working in the
>>> first place.
>>>
>>> Cheers
>>>
>>> Peter Allan
>>>
>>> On 20 October 2017 at 09:43, Wilm Boerhout <wboerhout at gmail.com <mailto:
>>> wboerhout at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>>
>>>     Matt Burke schreef op 17-10-2017 om 23:17:
>>>
>>>         You may also want to try VAX/VMS 1.0 (or as close as you can
>>>         get to it):
>>>
>>>
>>>         http://www.9track.net/vms/BB-D782A-BE.zip
>>>         <http://www.9track.net/vms/BB-D782A-BE.zip>
>>>
>>>         This is not taken from an original tape. It's something I
>>>         reconstructed
>>>         from a disk containing early VAX/VMS source and binaries. The
>>>         dates
>>>         indicate that this is earlier than VAX/VMS 1.5.
>>>         Hopefully someone can find an original at some point.
>>>
>>>         Matt
>>>         _______________________________________________
>>>         Simh mailing list
>>>         Simh at trailing-edge.com <mailto:Simh at trailing-edge.com>
>>>         http://mailman.trailing-edge.com/mailman/listinfo/simh
>>>         <http://mailman.trailing-edge.com/mailman/listinfo/simh>
>>>
>>>
>>>     Wonderful!
>>>
>>>
>>>     I now have VMS 1.0 up and running on simh VAX780. Does anyone know
>>>     whereto find the Fortran installation tape for this system?
>>>
>>>
>>>     BTW, I also use a fine VT52 emulator I found on github.
>>>
>>>
>>>     /Wilm
>>>
>>>
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>>>     http://mailman.trailing-edge.com/mailman/listinfo/simh
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>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>
>>
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