--- Antonio Carlini <Antonio.Carlini_at_riverstonenet.com> wrote:
> > I would have thought it was an Alpha box...
>
> I think the sun was in your eyes
It was. :-( Paint me for an enthusiastic goob.
> It's almost certainly a DEC 4000-710 (which is
> probably a win: they are rarer than VAX 4000-70x
> machines IMHO). I don't think Ultrix ever ran
> on the VAX 4000 machines.
Bingo. I still think I'd rather have had it be a VAX 4000-70x,
though. I'm a big Qbus fan. OTOH, I finally have a VMS box
with SCSI and I can *finally* start burning my magtapes to CD,
presuming I'm not hosed by big rot/media rot. I've kept the tapes
vertical, but I haven't run them through a drive every few years
to prevent print-through. At least they are 1600 bpi; perhaps
they'll be more robust than if they were 6520.
What I'm really interested in transferring are my final backup tapes
from the days when I used a VAX as my primary source of computrons
(c. 1988-1994). I do still have the disk that these tapes were cut
from, but it's an old Fujitsu Eagle, and I'd be happy to not be
dependent on it being intact after 8 years of not being powered on.
Besides, digging out the SI9900 and the 11/750 it's attached to and
dragging them to someplace I can power them up would be a massive pain.
> Sounds to me like you won big time here :-)
The interesting part is I almost walked out without it. They _never_
have anything cooler than a SPARCstation there.* I asked about the
TK50Z-FA in the cage (to be priced and set out next week) to see if
any other DEC gear was lurking in the corners and the guy said, "how
about that big box over there..." I'd walked past it twice, but because
it was so new, I didn't recognize it as DEC. I thought it was HP or
something. It doesn't resemble any of the DEC stuff I ever played
with (on the outside... once I opened the front and back covers, it
started to look more familiar, but mostly because of the MMJs more than
anything else).
But yes, I'd call it a big win. The only part I really wanted was the
TSZ07, but it was priced as a unit...
-ethan
* Not lately, anyway. I have gotten some 3' tall formica-topped
PDP-11/03s there, and a carload of 8032 PETs for $10 each about 12 years
ago. I also found the tabletop and mounting bracket for a DECmate-I
in the back of the warehouse. I had recently gotten the RX02 pedestal
and system unit (VT100 w/CPU boards) on the way to the dumpster, so I
recognized the table and bracket for what they were when I saw them).
Of all the gear I have ever gotten from them, so far, that table has seen
the most use - it's the table I put my SPARCstations on - from a SPARC1,
through a SS1+, SS2, Classic, LX and now SS5-110. The monitor sits nicely
on the pedestal and the CPU sits on the desk-side. I have the CPU on
the floor next to it, but without an RL278, I don't have a frequent need
to use a DECmate. I might as well use an -8/a w/RL8A.
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Received on Wed May 01 2002 - 17:21:30 BST