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Hardware /
SI3040-4043 SI3040 frontpanel  SI3040 backside In 1975 we got a hard-disk drive, finally! It was a non-standard "non-DEC" drive. The controller was build by a company called System Industries . I found an old ad describing the company's qualities!.  An old ad In the left-most picture you can see the drive (built by Data Recording Instrument Co Ltd (UK)). Over the drive the black front-panel of the controller. In second-left picture a view of the back of the controller. From bottom to top: the drive, the controller, and the power supply. For a detailed view of the internals see SI3040 exploded.
 Some 4043 disks  SI3040 interface It used the standard 4043 or 4044 cartridges as shown in the picture on the left. All disks still turned out to be readable (after 20 years!) and these were converted to the M43 format
The controller naturally had a bus interface as shown on second-left picture.
These disk had a format/size very similar to the RK05 disks, the difference is a slightly bigger size. An extract from the ETOS manual shows this difference: ETOS RK05 description and
ETOS SI description. The drive we have is 100 tracks/inch, the one shown for ETOS had 200 tracks/inch. |
