Over-the-hill geek test: do you recognize "1200 8-N-1" and know what it means???

[ScoobMaster]

If you know what "1200 8-N-1" or "1200 E-7-1" means, post a reply and explain it to the "young 'uns" LOL

Congrats, you qualify as an aging geek (llike me) .

 

[iamwiz82]

1200baud 8 data bits, no parity, 1 stop bit


I'm young, i swear. My company just happens to use this archaic info to allow PLCs to communicate to each other.

 

[Nohr]

Fraid so.. ahh the good ole BBS days.

 

[LeeTJ]

1200 baud
even parity
7 data bits
1 stop bit.

 

[kranky]

Yep, I know what that means. I even know why it takes 10 bits of bandwidth to transmit an 8-bit byte, and what an acoustic coupler is.

 

[dman]

How about: What's is (an) 8250 or 16550? What is the difference between them (Technical or functional)?

 

[ScoobMaster]

Originally posted by: dman6666
How about: What's is (an) 8250 or 16550? What is the difference between them (Technical or functional)?

Wowzers...... UART (Universal Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter)!

(clearing cobwebs from portion of brain not used in a decade).

Glad to see some of you remember the old asynchronous days

 

[vegetation]

If you bought a spanking new 14.4 modem and had an 8250 based serial port, you were screwed., missing characters and such.

Originally posted by: dman6666
How about: What's is (an) 8250 or 16550? What is the difference between them (Technical or functional)?

 

[radioouman]

Originally posted by: dman6666
How about: What's is (an) 8250 or 16550? What is the difference between them (Technical or functional)?

If I remember correctly, 8250 UARTS only support up to 19200 baud. 16500 UARTS support at least 115200 baud, which is what you should be running to communicate with your external 56k serial modem.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

I remember (and had to deal with) 300 baud. I recall seeing characters forming on my screen, one at a time.

 

[dman]

Originally posted by: radioouman

Originally posted by: dman6666
How about: What's is (an) 8250 or 16550? What is the difference between them (Technical or functional)?

If I remember correctly, 8250 UARTS only support up to 19200 baud. 16500 UARTS support at least 115200 baud, which is what you should be running to communicate with your external 56k serial modem.

Yup. 16550 has a 16byte buffer. The 8250's had no buffer. It was a joyful day when 16550 became the standard.

----------

What are the port ranges and IRQ's for COM1...4 recommended / by default (there is no 'standard')? From memory, no (google) searches.

 

[ATLien247]

Ahhh... the memories!

Damn I'm old!

 

[conjur]

Procomm ROCKED!

 

[Whizzy]

Then all you old 'geeks' must know what a Vesa Local Bus was....

 

[sciencetoy]

1200 8-N-1: That's old? I thought an over-the-hill geek test would have something about tube cooling and punch card shortcuts. Not that I remember anything about them, of course (he lied).

 

[Peetoeng]

Originally posted by: conjur
Procomm ROCKED!

kERmIt rUl3z!

 

[Monel Funkawitz]

Originally posted by: Peetoeng

Originally posted by: conjur
Procomm ROCKED!

kERmIt rUl3z!

I always used ZModem with Procomm+ Kermit never worked right for me, and I got better results with Zmodem than any other protocol.

God I miss the BBS days.

BTW, Vesa Local Bus was retarded. PCI stomped it.

"The VLB is a 32-bit bus which is in a way a direct extension of the 486 processor/memory bus. A VLB slot is a 16-bit ISA slot with third and fourth slot connectors added on the end. The VLB normally runs at 33 MHz, although higher speeds are possible on some systems. Since it is an extension of the ISA bus, an ISA card can be used in a VLB slot, although it makes sense to use the regular ISA slots first and leave the (small number of) VLB slots open for VLB cards, which won't work in an ISA slot of course. Use of a VLB video card and I/O controller greatly increases system performance over an ISA-only system.

While VLB was extremely popular during the reign of the 486, with the introduction of the Pentium and its PCI local bus in 1994, wholesale abandonment of the VLB began in earnest. While Intel pushing PCI was one reason why this happened, there were also several key problems with the VLB implementation. First, the design was strongly based on the 486 processor, and adapting it to the Pentium caused a host of compatibility and other problems. Second, the bus itself was tricky electrically; for example, the number of cards that could be used on the bus was low (often only two or even one), and occasionally there could be timing problems on the bus when more than one card was used. Finally, the bus did not support bus mastering properly since there was no good arbitration scheme, and did not support Plug and Play."

 

[kranky]

Originally posted by: Whizzy
Then all you old 'geeks' must know what a Vesa Local Bus was....

It was a PC standard for about a week and a half, during which time I bought a really expensive PC. Then found out later I was stuck with that proprietary video card for eternity.

 

[squirrel dog]

I remember when I went from a 1200 to a 2400 baud modem.I ruled the earth.

 

[luv2chill]

Originally posted by: squirrel dog
I remember when I went from a 1200 to a 2400 baud modem.I ruled the earth.

Yes I still remember how excited I was when I got my Supra 2400 bps modem.

Heh... xmodem, ymodem, zmodem... haven't said those words in years.

l2c

 

[Feanor727]

oh god. does knowing what those terms mean really make me old? *shudders uncontrollably*

I suppose still owning a 5.25" floppy drive and it's accompanying disks doesn't help. Anyone else rememeber using the "Turbo" switch?

All this and only 21...

 

[dman]

Seems like ages ago, but, NOT: How about the numeric speed displays on the front of the PC's. How long was yours ever the right number? I just changed all mine to say HI and LO. I sort of miss those useless things.

 

[DevilsAdvocate]

Damn I am getting old. I remember all that stuff.

 

[sharkeeper]

Anyone remember nixie tubes?

We still have equipment that uses them. After a 30+ hour shift (sigh), watching wildly flucuating readings is mildly hypnotic due to the character offset!

Cheers!

 

[UNCjigga]

8 N 1? Hmm, back in Canada we used 7 Even Space...