Re: Corvus Systems??

[hirsch@air.steve.net (Steven N. Hirsch)]

In article <34347964.1D6CA49@ic.net>, John Fosselman wrote:
>TheCowgod wrote:

>
>> I snagged a big Corvus Systems box out of someone's trash, but I'm not exactly
>>  sure what it its.
>>
>> I read that Corvus made Apple II hard disks, and this box does have a 20MB
>>  internal drive, but there's some things that make me suspect that it is NOT
>>  just a hard disk...
>>
>> First, it has video in/out jacks in the back, as well as a VCR remote port (?).
>>  There are also ports labelled "Drive" and "Processor".

That is a 20-Meg Corvus "flat-cable" drive.  It actually was designed
to function with a number of different machines besides Apple II's.
You would need their bus adapter for the A2 to get it going.

The VCR remote port and RCA jacks were intended to support an internal
"Mirror" board (see below).

>> Second, there were two smaller boxes along with the large one. One is labelled
>>  as "Mirror", and has a ribbon cable hanging out the back, and the video jacks.
>>  The other is labelled "OMNINET Disk Server". It has no ports, except for the
>>  power connector.

Ok, the "Mirror" was an adapter which permitted image backups of the
hard drive on a VCR.  I have one with the support software, and it is
kind of cute.

The Disk Server adapted the "flat-cable" drive to work with their
newer "Omninet" protocol.  It was a 1-Mb/sec. serial network using
unshielded twisted-pair cable.

Steve