Top 10 Holy Grails of Classic Microcomputer Collecting

From: William Donzelli <william_at_ans.net>
Date: Mon Oct 5 22:11:14 1998

> I've always wanted to know which machines have only a single instance
> represented on this list.
>
> I know we have multiple IBM 5100's here, many Altair 8800's, multiple Lisa
> 1's, multiple EC-1's, even multiple Apple 1's!

I have an Interdata 14 - I know of no other Interdatas at all, except for
a Model 4 at RCS/RI. Lots made - few saved.

I also have a few other machines that are really not rare, but probably
are unique to the list - Data General Nova 4 and Eclipse S/230, SGI IRIS
2500T, CDC Cyber 910 (AKA SGI IRIS 3130). In the definitely odd
department is a very interesting VAX-11/730 with a CDC tag.

And how about a "Holy Grail" list of Big Iron? Mine would be (in no
order):

1. IBM 700 series
2. IBM 650
3. IBM 7000 series
4. IBM S/360 or S/370 series
5. Burroughs B5500
6. Cray-1
7. Thinking Machines CM-1
8. Univac 1
7. Bendix G-15
8. CDC 6000 series
9. DEC PDP-1
10. DEC KA10 or KI10

Sure, some of these were made in the thousands (S/360 Model 40, for
example), but due to the nature of big iron - few remain. If the list were
made up of machines made in single digits, it would be full of supers.

William Donzelli
william_at_ans.net
Received on Mon Oct 05 1998 - 22:11:14 BST