The never-released HP-72S / HP-74S - the successors of the HP-71B

[J-F Garnier]

I recently recovered some documents about the never-released HP-72S and HP-74S. These machines could have been the successors of the HP-71B, unfortunately this never happened, apparently.

I didn't remember anything about possible 72S and 74S machines, but I made some strange dreams in the last couple of months, and I'm wondering if it could be possible that I knew something at the time, and that everything has been erased from my mind. Also I can't find anything in the old user club publications, but I guess that any reference would have been deleted a long time ago and replaced by articles on new RPL machines.

I can't give more details right now, but I should get soon a picture of 72S and 74S possible prototypes.
Also I hope to be able to publish ROM images of these machines. I may need some more time to get them however, my source it is very far in time and space, and thus has a very low data transfer rate.
We all know that the universe is not unique, so there is surely a place where reality is different.

In the meantime, you can have a look at the attached documents. There are already a lot of information about what could have happened, and what we missed here.

Of course, all this should be kept confidential, and may mysteriously disappear at any time, including from your own mind :-)

J-F

[Massimo Gnerucci]

Have a good March, 32nd!
:P

[rprosperi]

Blinded by excitement, I did swallow the bait for 30 secs, and then abruptly came to my senses. How might one forget this??? The taterred paper look was classy touch!

Well played Jean-Francois... Merci Beaucoups

[Jake Schwartz]

The amazing thing is that all this stuff could probably have been done...nothing seems ridiculous here. More "future retro" :-)
Jake

[Gene]

And I suspect the reason for that is the probable lack of sales of these units in sufficient quantities to make it a good business decision. Granted, HP didn't seem to try to ** sell ** them very well, but still... sigh.

[J-F Garnier]

(04-01-2021 05:39 PM)Jake Schwartz Wrote:  The amazing thing is that all this stuff could probably have been done...nothing seems ridiculous here. More "future retro" :-)

You've got it !

The 72S/74S never existed of course and, to my knowledge, no such projects ever existed inside HP.

My "Titan X" project (as I'm calling it) is to answer to this question: what would have happened next if the 71B had been a big success for HP?

So let's image:
We are in 1987-1988. The 71B, thanks to a great marketing strategy, is a big success and is even eclipsing the already-old 41CX, so the question is how to extend the 71B market and lifetime.
No revolution intended here, just an evolution, in the same way as the 41CX followed the 41CV, and the 28S is going to replace the 28C.
The major points to address are identified as:
- a bigger screen: it's not possible to continue to live with a 22-character display,
- larger memory: 16KB is definitively not enough, and the 4K modules absolutely obsolete,
- a faster CPU: the HP-71B was initially designed to run at 1MHz, but had to be slowed down to about 640kHz, making the HP-71B a quite slow machine. This is no more acceptable.

Actually, I answered most of these concerns in my Emu71/DOS long ago, my three main motivations of the time were to get a HP-71B with: big memory, high speed and large display.

But my today's Titan X project is different, it is to imagine what a real machine could be. So I used the Emu71 for Windows of my friend Christoph as a basis, and built Emu72, an emulator of the 72S and 74S machines.
You can find this emulator on my new emu72 page:



The HP-72S is fully functional, with its own brand new ROM 3EEEE derived from the HP-71B 2CDCC and providing extended functionalities (see the documentation on my site).
It's so nice to now view the full CAT output, or a complex value without having to scroll the display!

The HP-74S is working too, but still as a prototype using the same HP-72S ROM and so not using the full multiline screen capability.

Experiment, and enjoy !

J-F

[Gene]

One thing HP would never have done is use the 74S model. By this time, TI had already used the TI-74 model and even a TI-74S. :-)

[KimH]

Thanks for for this - even though it is AF it probably has some elements of truth.

Someone will know, but we don’t. Wish we did

(04-02-2021 04:42 PM)J-F Garnier Wrote:  

(04-01-2021 05:39 PM)Jake Schwartz Wrote:  The amazing thing is that all this stuff could probably have been done...nothing seems ridiculous here. More "future retro" :-)

You've got it !

The 72S/74S never existed of course and, to my knowledge, no such projects ever existed inside HP.

My "Titan X" project (as I'm calling it) is to answer to this question: what would have happened next if the 71B had been a big success for HP?

So let's image:
We are in 1987-1988. The 71B, thanks to a great marketing strategy, is a big success and is even eclipsing the already-old 41CX, so the question is how to extend the 71B market and lifetime.
No revolution intended here, just an evolution, in the same way as the 41CX followed the 41CV, and the 28S is going to replace the 28C.
The major points to address are identified as:
- a bigger screen: it's not possible to continue to live with a 22-character display,
- larger memory: 16KB is definitively not enough, and the 4K modules absolutely obsolete,
- a faster CPU: the HP-71B was initially designed to run at 1MHz, but had to be slowed down to about 640kHz, making the HP-71B a quite slow machine. This is no more acceptable.

Actually, I answered most of these concerns in my Emu71/DOS long ago, my three main motivations of the time were to get a HP-71B with: big memory, high speed and large display.

But my today's Titan X project is different, it is to imagine what a real machine could be. So I used the Emu71 for Windows of my friend Christoph as a basis, and built Emu72, an emulator of the 72S and 74S machines.
You can find this emulator on my new emu72 page:



The HP-72S is fully functional, with its own brand new ROM 3EEEE derived from the HP-71B 2CDCC and providing extended functionalities (see the documentation on my site).
It's so nice to now view the full CAT output, or a complex value without having to scroll the display!

The HP-74S is working too, but still as a prototype using the same HP-72S ROM and so not using the full multiline screen capability.

Experiment, and enjoy !

J-F

[rprosperi]

(04-02-2021 04:42 PM)J-F Garnier Wrote:  But my today's Titan X project is different, it is to imagine what a real machine could be. So I used the Emu71 for Windows of my friend Christoph as a basis, and built Emu72, an emulator of the 72S and 74S machines.
You can find this emulator on my new emu72 page:



Experiment, and enjoy !

J-F

Amazing new gift Jean-Francois, you've outdone yourself!!

This announcement provides insight into some of your recent questions about the BASIC family command changes, etc.

Very, very cool.

Off to give it a test drive...

Qucik Feedback#1 - Emu72/72S crashes when I do almost anything using 72S/1024 version. It initially comes on, displays the ">" prompt and the cursor blinks, so I shut off to add modules via the Port Config dialog. I add a 32K RAM module to port-0 and HP-IL (I assume using the standard HP-IL ROM) to port-6, then save config. When I then power-on, the prompt ">" appears, but no cursor; I must then press [ON] twice to get a blinking cursor.

From there, VER$ works, MEM shows 66092, but CAT crashes immediately, as does any activity which needs more than the 1st line of the LCD.

The 800x600 version seems to be more stable, however I see nothing in the 2nd line.

I'm testing on Win7-Pro x64.

I'll try some more tomorrow, but wanted to get you some feedback as early as possible. Please suggest some things to try that may reveal more about the issues.

[Dave Frederickson]

So if a 71B KML is opened in EMU72 we get a 71B+?

[twoweims]

I have really mixed emotions about this...

Will this make my 71B seem inadequate and make me yearn for hardware that can never be?

Downloading now...

This looks like a job for SwissMicros! DM-74S, anyone?

[Dave Frederickson]

(04-02-2021 10:59 PM)twoweims Wrote:  Will this make my 71B seem inadequate and make me yearn for hardware that can never be?

Maybe not. What happens if you load the 3eeee firmware into the SYSRAM of your FRAM71B?

[twoweims]

(04-03-2021 03:54 AM)Dave Frederickson Wrote:  

(04-02-2021 10:59 PM)twoweims Wrote:  Will this make my 71B seem inadequate and make me yearn for hardware that can never be?

Maybe not. What happens if you load the 3eeee firmware into the SYSRAM of your FRAM71B?

A bright flash of light and a quantum singularity, I would imagine.

[J-F Garnier]

(04-02-2021 08:04 PM)rprosperi Wrote:  Qucik Feedback#1 - Emu72/72S crashes when I do almost anything using 72S/1024 version. It initially comes on, displays the ">" prompt and the cursor blinks, so I shut off to add modules via the Port Config dialog. I add a 32K RAM module to port-0 and HP-IL (I assume using the standard HP-IL ROM) to port-6, then save config. When I then power-on, the prompt ">" appears, but no cursor; I must then press [ON] twice to get a blinking cursor.

From there, VER$ works, MEM shows 66092, but CAT crashes immediately, as does any activity which needs more than the 1st line of the LCD.

The 800x600 version seems to be more stable, however I see nothing in the 2nd line.

I'm testing on Win7-Pro x64.

I'll try some more tomorrow, but wanted to get you some feedback as early as possible. Please suggest some things to try that may reveal more about the issues.

I built emu72 with tools probably not as up-to-date as Christoph's tools, so emu72 may not be as stable as emu71 in all environments. However, I tested emu72 on my W2k dev machine and my every-day W10-64 bit laptop and they work fine, although I had a few crashes when switching kml scripts.
Please consider version 0.9 as a beta version for tests.

Keep in mind that when you first plug the HP-IL, you have to press ON a couple of times to recover the broken loop situation and do OFF IO or DISPLAY IS * to avoid the problem.
It was a bad choice to have the HP-IL display enabled by default and this is something I would like to improve in a possible HPIL 1C.

Also keep in mind the HP-72S 2-line LCD is actually one 44-character line folded into two parts, so you will see something on the 2nd line if the display exceeds 22 characters.
The HP-74S has a true 44-character line display.

(04-02-2021 09:46 PM)Dave Frederickson Wrote:  So if a 71B KML is opened in EMU72 we get a 71B+?

Yes !

Quote:What happens if you load the 3eeee firmware into the SYSRAM of your FRAM71B?

The 3eeee ROM will work fine in HP-71 emulators and even in a real HP-71B, although the 2nd part of the LCD is not present, so you will have to do WINDOW 1,22 to limit the display. Also the 3eeee is missing the card reader code (to make room for all the improvements) but that's not a problem if you have the FRAM71 installed.
(3eeee is a test version and doesn't have the proper checksums yet)

J-F

[J-F Garnier]

(04-02-2021 10:59 PM)twoweims Wrote:  I have really mixed emotions about this...

Will this make my 71B seem inadequate and make me yearn for hardware that can never be?

In all modesty, I feel the 72S more aesthetic than the 71B, I never liked/understood the step/discontinuity of the 71B frame over the numeric keys.

Quote:This looks like a job for SwissMicros! DM-74S, anyone?

I personally have a preference for a DM-72 !

J-F

[J-F Garnier]

(04-03-2021 08:49 AM)J-F Garnier Wrote:  

(04-02-2021 08:04 PM)rprosperi Wrote:  Qucik Feedback#1 - Emu72/72S crashes when I do almost anything using 72S/1024 version. It initially comes on, displays the ">" prompt and the cursor blinks, so I shut off to add modules via the Port Config dialog. I add a 32K RAM module to port-0 and HP-IL (I assume using the standard HP-IL ROM) to port-6, then save config. When I then power-on, the prompt ">" appears, but no cursor; I must then press [ON] twice to get a blinking cursor.

From there, VER$ works, MEM shows 66092, but CAT crashes immediately, as does any activity which needs more than the 1st line of the LCD.

The 800x600 version seems to be more stable, however I see nothing in the 2nd line.

I'm testing on Win7-Pro x64.

I'll try some more tomorrow, but wanted to get you some feedback as early as possible. Please suggest some things to try that may reveal more about the issues.

Update: Yes there is a problem.
I was doing all my tests with an existing e72 state file, but when I try to open a "New" kml, yes I can see the crash.
I'm investigating, in the meantime don't waste your time on it.

J-F

[Dave Frederickson]

I'd like to know more about the 3eeee ROM. I suspect it evolved from the 2CDCC source code, but I'm only aware of the 1BBBB code being available.

[J-F Garnier]

(04-03-2021 03:05 PM)Dave Frederickson Wrote:  I'd like to know more about the 3eeee ROM. I suspect it evolved from the 2CDCC source code, but I'm only aware of the 1BBBB code being available.

The 3eeee ROM is built from a 2CDCC dump, with patches.

I looked for the 2CCCC IDS document for a long time, but never found it.
If ever someone have it , or a copy, I would still be very interested !

Fortunately, the 1BBBB and 2CCCC/2CDCC versions are close enough to be able to modify the code with the help of the available IDS for the the 1BBBB .

J-F

[J-F Garnier]

Update: the fixed emu72 version 0.91 is on my site since a few days, and no problem has been found so far (thanks to the beta testers!).

J-F

[rprosperi]

Good news! Both Emu72 and the 3eeee ROM have been updated and the (what turned out to be a simple) issue reported above is resolved and now Emu72 w/new ROM is quite stable. You can load all normal HP ROMs (including Forth and 41Trans) as well as JPC ROM, JFG's recently enhanced MATH-2B ROM, etc. and they all behave as expected. I've installed lots of ROMs, and > 30 LEX files and have encountered no compatibility issues to date, using the v0.91 version.

Get the new files from the site linked above (get both the new Emu72 and the ROM) and check it out!!

Note: Some programs (e.g. C71) use the WINDOW command to control output and may leave such settings in place, which can appear to have disabled the wrapping feature when using the 2-line display in Emu72. If this happens, just use the command 'WINDOW 1' to reset its defaults and the wrapping display will be restored.

Thanks for the fixes J-F!