UFO over DEC

From: Paul Koning <pkoning_at_equallogic.com>
Date: Fri Mar 26 08:13:12 2004

>>>>> "Michael" == Michael Sokolov <msokolov_at_ivan.harhan.org> writes:

 Michael> * Were DLTs indeed made in Colorado Springs?

As far as I know they were designed in SHR (Shrewsbury, Mass.). Where
the manufacturing facility was I have no idea.

 Michael> * If it is indeed in Colorado Springs, does anyone have any
 Michael> more information on that ex-DEC facility? Does anyone know
 Michael> of any government/CSS work done there?

 Michael> * This guy also mentioned CD-ROMs. He said they made the
 Michael> first DEC CD-ROMs there, in 1993-94 timeframe. I thought
 Michael> the first CD-ROM sold by DEC was RRD40 and was actually a
 Michael> Philips drive, wasn't it? The next was RRD42, which was
 Michael> actually made by Sony, right? Did DEC ever build CD-ROM
 Michael> drives themselves or did they all outsourced to Sony and
 Michael> such? If RRD40 and RRD42 were Philips/Sony, why did they
 Michael> need a clean room in Colorado Springs? Or was it the next
 Michael> one, RRD43? Was RRD43 also Sony or was it made by DEC
 Michael> itself? What was DEC's cutting edge CD-ROM drive in
 Michael> 1993-94? Did they make any CD-ROM drives at the same place
 Michael> where they made DLTs? It kinda makes sense that it would be
 Michael> the same group, "Tape and Optical Products" if I'm not
 Michael> mistaken, but just checking.

Storage was in several places... and DEC often did manufacturing in
random places in the world.

I don't remember whether DEC ever made CDROM drives. But there's an
interesting story I remember -- way back in the early days of CDROMs,
I heard that DEC was planning to build a CD factory (to make the
disks, not the drives). That was so they could make the media in
volume. The plan at the time was to put CDROM drives into every VAX
and put all the software on one CDROM. (Back then software was small
enough that you could do this...). Apparently, this is why License
Manager was invented. I don't remember the date for this anymore --
it seems to me it would have been somewhere around 1985.

   paul
Received on Fri Mar 26 2004 - 08:13:12 GMT