Xref: utzoo comp.os.vms:25171 comp.sys.dec:3172
Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!kaukau.comp.vuw.ac.nz!comp.vuw.ac.nz!gpwd!gpwrdcs
From: don@gp.govt.nz (Don Stokes)
Newsgroups: comp.os.vms,comp.sys.dec
Subject: Re: A piece of History...
Message-ID: <1181.2645c05b@gp.govt.nz>
Date: 7 May 90 07:56:53 GMT
References: <2732@husc6.harvard.edu> <11461@blia.BLI.COM> <1308.26442bec@vmsa.technion.ac.il> <1990May6.213507.7737@spock.UUCP>
Organization: Government Printing Office, Wellington, New Zealand
Lines: 51

In article <1990May6.213507.7737@spock.UUCP>, eric@spock.UUCP (Eric Volpe) writes:
> Heck, I've got a brochure on DEC's "new" PDP-4 computer, and also one for
> the PDP-1, and a couple of boards out of a pdp-1! They're built using
> "cordwood" construction - two separate PC boards with the components in 
> between. Most, like resistors and capacitors and stuff, have one lead in
> each board. I don't know about transistors; I don't think they existed yet.

Did you see any valves?  Must have been transistors or ICs in there 
somewhere (did they have ICs then? ... it was about that sort of time).


I'm not going to try to beat anyone on age of parts; (we'll leave that to
the real grey-beards) but I thought I'd list a bit of the esoterica at my
disposal: 

At home:
        Hard sectored 5.25" floppy disks.
        800 BPI RSX 4.1 kit.
        PDP-11/34A (fully operational, use it a lot), circa 1979.
        2xRL01 disk drives, attached to PDP-11/34 (10 Megs!  Wow!)
        Hardware & maintenance docs for 11/34 and peripherals.
        MicroPDP-11 (/23+), twice the memory, 3 times the disk (RD52),
                            half the power (watts, not MIPS)...
                            Soon to be upgraded to a /73 - three times 
                            the MIPS...
        1976 DEC Logic Handbook, including the *new* LSI-11 Microcomputer.
        1978 DEC Microcomputer Handbook

At work:
        A MicroVAX I, with RD52.
        A VAX 11/730.
        Part 5/5 of VMS V3.4, on TU58, dated 27-Oct-1983.
        TK50 cartridge with tape missing (eaten by drive).
        PDT-11/150s

Sigh.  VMS doesn't fit on our baby MicroVAX I any more.  RSX-11M runs
just fine in 128KW memory and 5MB disk on my trusty 11/34A, as well as
providing heating for the house....... 

In the subject of books, how many people get hold of DEC handbooks and
flick through them just to look at the pictures?  I thought it was a
trait peculiar to me, until the last DECUS LUG meeting (four of us turned
up; well it *was* on the subject of PDP-11s), when somebody else
remarked, to nods of assent, that the pictures were what made the
handbooks interesting.... 


Don Stokes, ZL2TNM    /  /                              PSI%(5301)47000028::DON
Systems Programmer   /GP/ Government Printing Office      Postmaster@gp.govt.nz
____________________/  /__Wellington__New_Zealand________________don@gp.govt.nz
          No job is so simple that it can't possibly get screwed up.