Final tally from the VAX fairy

From: Chuck McManis <cmcmanis_at_mcmanis.com>
Date: Wed Aug 2 21:09:51 2000

Ok, so after a day of intermittantly going out to the pile and moving it
indoors I've got the final VAX fairy tally:
        2 - BA123 Chassis
                Chassis 1 has a VAXStation II badge
                a KA630, 8MB (+1) of RAM the DEQNA
                RQDX3, and TQK50. Peripherals were
                two RD53's and a "hole" where the
                TK50 would have been.
        
                There are also four "Avalon" boards
                which are quad width, have a Mot 88K
                processor on them, something like a
                4MB daughter card, one edge connector
                (26 pin) and a couple of LEDs. No clue
                what these do.

                Chassis 2 has that I've been stored
                in the outside air about it. It had
                the tighted MV2 system I've seen,
                KA630, MS630-BA, and a dual width
                MS630-AA (4MB total) and an RQDX3
                all in the first three slots. No
                ethernet, nothing else. One RD53
                and one hole where the TK50 would
                go. (hope they didn't think they were
                DLT drives :-)

        2 - BA23 chassis
                Chassis 1 was badged MicroVAX III and
                yielded a KA655 + two third party memory
                boards, both with socketed ram chips, one
                only half populated. Weird. This system
                also had an Emulex QD32 SMD controller
                for Q-bus, and an Emulex Pertec tape controller.
                

                Chassis 2 (separate rack) was badged MVII
                and had a KA630 + 8MB, a DEQNA, and an RQDX3.
                Then on the bottom it had an Emulex UC07 scsi
                controller, but the board literally had a spiders
                nest on it. I'm going to clean it up and see
                if it works. that would be a great deal if it
                did.

The MicroVAX 3 appeared to be complete but the rack it was in had clearly
fallen on its side at some point (perhaps during transport or in the
parking lot) the damaage actually looked pretty old, but it had to be noisy
because the BA23 was _bent_. Now I've done a lot of things to BA23's since
I started playing with them and I can tell you it takes a hell of a whack
to bend one. The top cards were fine but the bottom card (a DHV11) was
bowed from the stresses placed on it. So much for that chassis!

Also in this rack was a pair of Fujitsu SMD drives that were on a dual disk
sled. Unfortunately there heads were not locked and they had been forcibly
bounced out of the rack slides. I'm not expecting them to have survived :-)

A couple of Unibus extender boxes (BA11-K) one with switching power supply
(about 25 lbs) one with linear supply (about 85 lbs!) The latter however
matches the decor on my 11/34a which has no backplane space left so to that
rack it goes. One had an M9313 terminator in it. (guess I can replace my
9302 in the 11/34 now)

A couple of Sigma Q-bus extenders (labels inside say "do not put a CPU in
this rack", I wonder why.) The one in the damaged rack was unsalvagable.
These both had the sigma qbus extender pairs.

Then there was one rack with a beautiful Kennedy 9400 Pertec tape drive.
I'm dying to see if this thing works, it actually looks like it was indoors
for most of its life. Tony or anyone else, is there a way to power this up
without connecting it up and seeing if it can load a tape? I've got an
emulex controller for it but the cables were shredded and so they are of no
use to me. I'm wondering if I can plug it in and power it up to see if it
works.

Then a few misc Unibus boards, docs for various things, the rattiest
MicroVAX 2000 I have ever seen, all rusted at the connectors. (Looks like
it could have literally been used as a boat anchor!) It was hiding yet
another RD53 inside.

I've also got a Emulex quad width board that looks like an SMD controller,
part number is: QD3510206. I've got no use for it, I'm not crazy enough to
try to run every type of disk technology and SMD is right out.

Anyway, it was a remarkable thing to find literally on ones doorstep. Now
to see how many of the systems can be salvaged, get parts to people who
need them and who knows. I'm hoping to have a fully restored MVII in a
BA123 available at VCF for sale. Sort of a complete system for the new
collector who doesn't have furniture yet :-)

--Chuck
Received on Wed Aug 02 2000 - 21:09:51 BST