WTB: Pro380, VAXstation

From: Zane H. Healy <healyzh_at_aracnet.com>
Date: Thu Apr 15 17:24:26 2004

> If you're dilligent, on Ebay a PDP micro-11/73 can go for between $100-300+,
> and expect to pay between $30-70 for shipping, depending on what kind of
> chassis it has. A DEC Pro 350 w/HDD will cost you less than $100. A pdp-11/23
> will go for between $75-150+.
>
> While It's true that an 11/73 is probably a better choice should you want to
> run a variety of OS's, a dec pro will allow you to own a pdp-11/23+ cheaply.

Hands down, a /73 or better is the way to go. While a Pro350/380 might be
cheaper, you're seriously restricted as to what you can use for disk drives
(IIRC RD51, RD52, and RD53). With a Q-Bus based PDP-11 you can use 3rd
party disk controllers that let you use non-DEC MFM, ESDI, or SCSI Hard
Drives.

Personally I feel the best plan is to simply start collecting all the pieces
needed to build a /23+ or /73 (chassis, CPU, RAM, Disk Controller, etc).
This is basically how I built my main PDP-11, though I have others that came
complete, or mostly complete.

                Zane
Received on Thu Apr 15 2004 - 17:24:26 BST