Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!ut-sally!utah-cs!cetron
From: cetron@utah-cs.UUCP (Edward J Cetron)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec
Subject: Re: PDP-11 Questions
Message-ID: <5325@utah-cs.UUCP>
Date: 7 Mar 88 16:57:31 GMT
References: <35029O05@PSUVM>
Reply-To: cetron@cs.utah.edu.UUCP (Edward J Cetron)
Organization: Center for Engineering Design, Univ of Utah
Lines: 57
Summary: good stuff

In article <35029O05@PSUVM> O05@PSUVM.BITNET writes:
>It looks like we will be recieving a donation of three PDP-11/23's in the near
>future, and no one here seems to know anything about them.  So here I go
>again.  So here come the questions, ready or not:
>
>        1) What operating system does it run?
		lots:  RSX-11M/M+, RT-11, TSX+, IAS, RSTS/E, even UNIX!!
			depends on what license comes with them.
>
>        2) Can it be adapted (hardware or software) to be a PC-NETWORK
>           file server?
		it depends on which PC-network protocol that you are using.
		it also depends on which of the above OS's you are running,
		but I'd say just offhand, relatively unlikely.
>
>        3) How good is software availability and diversity?
		Holy Huasfru, Batman - tons and tons and tons - DECUS has
		lots of 1600bpi magtapes full of PD software, I keep 50Mbytes
		of it online (and that is JUST for RSX and JUST the best stuff)
>
>        4) How popular is this machine?
		The PDP-11 business within Digital is roughly the size of
			COORS beer - nuff said?  I think there are over 1
			million RT-11 licenses alone.
>
>        5) Is it easy to operate, manage, and maintain?
		Ours break LOTS less than our 700-series vaxen, about the
		same as our micro-vaxen - once a year, maybe.
>
>        6) Does anybody have any experience with the PDP-11 as a A/D recording
>           device for electrical circuit testing, etc ... and what was your
>           conclusions about using it for this?

		We use ours for Data Acquisition of ALL kinds, nice stuff,
		clean, simple, and easy to understand.
>
>        7) What does it take to run this thing (power requirements,
>           peripherals, etc.), and what kinds of terminals does it require
>           (ascii dumb, vt-52, vt-220, vt-100, IBM-PC emulations)?
		just plug it into the wall with a good power surge protectors
		We have found the $40.00 model from EFI to be best. It will
		support most any rs232 async terminal, more or less dependent
		on the OS that you run.
>
>        8) What is the base cost on a PDP-11/23 (I don't have specs on memory
>           or disk storage).
		'bout a couple thousand, roughly.
>
>        9) What do YOU use the PDP-11 for ?

		Damn near everything but workstations and number crunching

-ed cetron
center for engineering design
univ of utah
cetron@cs.utah.edu
cetron@utahcca.bitnet