Texas Instruments Silent 700 Data Terminal Model 707

[Steven Mason]

Has anybody tried or see an obvious potential problem with attaching a Texas Instruments Silent 700 Data Terminal Model 707 to the PIDP8?

[Clem Cole]

Can’t speak specifically for the model 707 but with a prolific based usb to rs232 converter we had a silent 700 talking to a PC a while back.    Given you are using USB on the RPi, I see no reason why it should work. 

Sent from a handheld expect more typos than usual

On Wed, Aug 13, 2025 at 11:09 PM Steven Mason <sjmas...@gmail.com> wrote:

Has anybody tried or see an obvious potential problem with attaching a Texas Instruments Silent 700 Data Terminal Model 707 to the PIDP8?

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[Ron Lauzon]

I hooked my 703 up to my Altairduino without much problem.

The main thing for the Silent 700 is that it wants **all** control lines on the RS-232 end.  So I had to create my own adapter that loops RTS/CTS and DSR/DTR.

If the 703 didn't get those signals in, it wouldn't go online.

[Clem Cole]

This is why I say, get one of the better (Prolific or FTCI) based USB to RS-232C converters.  They are fully pinned and support HW flow control.  The only issue I have found is that early FTCI does not run at 10 or 15 cps, and the flow control on early Prolific ones at very high speeds sometimes drops characters (it was fixed in later versions of their chipsets).  I have used CHM340-based ones, but mostly those are built into things like Arduino, never as a standalone USB to RS-232C.

If anyone is interested, please send me an email offline, I can send you an 8-page document I wrote, which at some point will make it into the OpenSIM documents connection called: 

Using Serial Ports with a PiDP “Blinkenlights” Kit — SIMH on an RPi

(A>aching an old-style terminal to a PiDP for a traditional user interface)

My current examples are with the PiDP-11, and I need to update it to include an example with the PiDP-8, PiDP-10 and PiDP-1; but I've been busy with some other projects.   I suspect most people can use it as a reasonable guide here.  The core differences will only be in the hosted system's name and actions.  The Simulator and the RPi's part (which is the hard part and where most users make errors) should be identical).   Although things like the PDP-8 separate console input and console output in the OS naming, but like the PDP-11 simulation, the PDP-8 simulation on OpenSIMH basically treated them together (i.e. I believe that you name the input device for configuration and the console output will be set up that same way -- but I do not have that in the examples right now).

Clem

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