Hi Don,
Whats a VAX-780 and 11/40 device? Just curious........

                                        John

-----Original Message-----
From: Don McKenzie [mailto:don@DONTRONICS.COM]
Sent: Thursday, 20 April 2000 7:25
To: PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Re: [OT] Ah yes those were the days (but this is now)...


"Quitt, Walter" wrote:
> WOW!
> All this of old computing.  It brings back memories of
> core cache.  Talk about electro-magnetic tiny little
> things.
> Wire wrapped interface boards to PDP/11-45s.
> Ah, the late 70s, early 80s....

We had made the move from 11/40s to Vax-780s, and it was around the time
I had got hold of a Z80 and taught myself some assembly.

I hooked up a driver matrix so I could drive the address and data, plus
the run/bus/user/proc/console/virtual LEDs to emulate the typical run
pattern of the original machine.

I bolted just the front panel into the rack next to one of the 780s,
much to the amusement of the visiting engineers and programmers that
knew the 11/45. They had to ask what in the world we were still using it
for, as most were familiar with our current system, and this thing was
apparently humming away merrily.

When the LEDs went into the walking LED pattern shifting left/right,
etc., they then woke up that they had just been taken for a little ride.
:-)

The DEC boys loved it, and at one stage we were going to set it up at
their Melbourne head office, but this didn't eventuate for some reason.

I still have it here. Wonder if it still works. Was thinking of PIC'ing
it. Ah!!, so little time for fun!

Don McKenzie    mailto:don@dontronics.com      http://www.dontronics.com

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