Found a decent use for a PC...

From: William Donzelli <william_at_ans.net>
Date: Sun Feb 22 22:37:01 1998

> <I'd say it's not so much a matter of there being "no need for them"
> <(front panels), so much as the fact that machines are so fast any more
> <that I'm not sure how much use they'd be, especially with
> <multi-tasking operating systems. Before the address and data LEDs
> <stabilized with any useful information, it would be somewhere else.
>
> In some respects that is true even back then when instruction cycle
> time were in the 2-10uS bracket. You did get to see the average
> addresses that were freqently accessed. However, front pannels also
> posessed the ability to stop the cpu, and single step or single
> instruction advance it.

I was thinking that it is much easier to run diagnostic programs that
utilize many of the internal scan circuits found in todays processors.

Anyway, front panels are VERY expensive things!

William Donzelli
william_at_ans.net
Received on Sun Feb 22 1998 - 22:37:01 GMT