Doug Yowza wrote:
> There's a local surplus place selling a few Burroughs machines for $30
> that look interesting, but I know nothing about them -- I'm not even sure
> they're computers. I believe they were used by Delta airlines. There's
> no clear model number on them, but the closest thing to one says "B 27
> CLS" "3748 00681", so I'm guessing they are B27's which appear to be
> related to B25's which appear to be 186 boxen running BTOS (?) from
> 1985/86.
>
> I suppose I'll get one, since the price includes what looks to be a
> standard RS-232 terminal which might be useful.
>
> Anybody familiar with these beasties?
They are similar to the 25's that I used on Chanute AFB as an instructor up
until we closed the base in 1993. There waa also a clone (physically and in
working) made by NCR of both the B25 and 27. They did indeed run a BTOS
(Burroughs terminal Operating System) and a BASIC using an 80186 processor
housed in a square modular system that locked together. They had hard drive
modules and even servers that sat on the floor with a weird type of
removeable hard drive (Winchester?) When the terminal unit is turned on you
should see a series of periods showing activity in logging to the server. If
that stops then it's not connecting.
I haven't seen one since and after hours of banging away on one to compile
lesson plans I'm not too eager to see another too soon.
There's a guy that was our custodian for the Burroughs at Chanute that now
works at the U of Tennessee at Knoxville. His name is Elmer Baumgardner and
his email is ELMERB_at_UTK.EDU. I'm not sure how much of all of that he
remembers though since many changes in his duty stations since leaving
Chanute and then retiring to a civilian job in a university with
who-knows-what type of networks.
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Russ Blakeman
RB Custom Services / Rt. 1 Box 62E / Harned, KY USA 40144
Phone: (502) 756-1749 Data/Fax:(502) 756-6991
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Received on Wed Apr 08 1998 - 20:39:06 BST