Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: What is so greate about the PDP 10?
From: don@zl2tnm.gen.nz (Don Stokes)
Date: 20 Dec 92 07:55:04 GMT
Distribution: world
Organization: The Wolery

lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
> True, but IBM didn't make those 704 users pay so much that they curled up
> and died for well over 20 years.

Uh, but IBM users are *used* to paying big maintenance bills!

> As far as I'm concerned, System 3 never was a viable product, and its
> followons 32, 34, 36, 38, 36-revisited, AS-400 are as miserable.  But that's
> besides the point.  IBM isn't telling existing customers to chuck them by
> manipulating them into a newer product by the extortive technique of telling
> them they are officially obsoleting the product.  On the contrary, they kept
> stringing along customers claiming that actual software was going to be
> producted for these turkeys.

Ummm, making it clear to all the /36 customers that their machine isn't
going anywhere and they'll have to migrate to an AS/400 (or another vendor)
to upgrade their hardware comes pretty close.  It looks to me like Jupiter
all over again.

> >	Robin (VT180)	CP/M in a VT100, probably too expensive
> 
> Another stopgap; the VT-180 was a retrofit for existing VT-100 boxes; DEC
> got caught up into that obligatory market where you just had to have a 
> *something* that ran CP/M.  Having a minimal peripheral set made it a toy
> even by CP/M standards.

I don't know what DEC charged for it, but it doesn't seem a lot different
to most of the CP/M boxes of the day.

I forgot to mention the VT103 -- an LSI 11/2 processor and LSI-11 bus 
backplane in a VT100.  Nice idea, again didn't go far.  I heard of someone
rewiring the bus and putting a KA630 and memory in there....  VAX in a VT.

> >	Pro/350		F-11 chip, let down by s/w
> 
> No, let down by itself.  It's not compatible with certain key requirements of
> existing -11 software.  It caused wasted efforts to attempt to make the
> prevailing -11 software be compatible with its incompatibilities, and was
> only partially successful and at great expense.  The incompatiblity could've
> easily been avoided.  Same for DECmates.  Moral: don't let Harris Semiconductor
> design the software configuration of your hardware you farm out the design
> of to them.

DEC should have put RSX on these boxes, not a crippled version.  The pdp11
hackers who tried to use them got quickly frustrated by the nearly-RSX-but-
not-quite-ness of P/OS.  RSX is good enough that you don't need to program
on the bare metal to get anything done.  Serious pdp11 hackers ran RT11 on
them.  Later came the Pro/325, which was only good for running RT11.

I don't think DEC really knew what they were going to do with these boxes
when they were designed.  At the time I got the impression DEC left the
customer to figure out what to do with them.

> >	DECmate III	Small box DECmate, shares many characteristics with 
> >			DECmate II, but not parts (Intersil 6120)!
> 
> This was a partial VLSI treatment of the DM II to get the whole thing smaller.

Not a bad size either.  That probably accounted a lot for the popularity 
of the things; the system box sits neatly under the monitor with very little
waste space.  I rather like them, even if Charles doesn't.  8-)

> >	Pro/380		Faster 350 (J-11 chip)
> 
> Better, but still "tainted" by the Pro/325 and 350.

Still had the same software problems.  It was a bit faster, but lacking
cache, so nowhere near as fast as other J11 systems.

> The III is the "toy" model and comes with only two floppies and no upgrade
> possible, while the II has 2 floppies and optionally more floppies or a
> hard disk.

Gee Charles, so what did you do with the III -> III+ upgrade "kit" I sent 
you?  

(Admittedly, the "upgrade" does consist of chucking out everything that 
makes it a III and replacing it with III+ parts.  You get to keep the
box.  Maybe the power supply too, but it should really be replaced with 
a bigger one.  8-)

IIIs & III+s were very popular here.  I got mine off a pile of 40-odd of
'em that were being disposed of (after DG did a better selling job into a 
certain Govt Dept than DEC did) -- I got in early, people getting in afterward
found the price had gone up a lot....  (It seems I managed to pick the only
one in the pile with an APU (CP/M) board too....)

--
Don Stokes, ZL2TNM (DS555)                        don@zl2tnm.gen.nz (home)
Network Manager, Computing Services Centre            don@vuw.ac.nz (work)
Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand              +64-4-495-5052