2 Dec
2006
2 Dec
'06
9:15 a.m.
On Mon, 2006-10-30 at 15:44 -0700, Al Kossow wrote:
There *is* a complete UNIVAC 1108 with a FASTRAND II and some other
goodies preserved - of all places - in the Industrial Worker's museum,
which used to be a hydroelectric plant, (one of the first) in Norway. It
is in the middle of freakin' nowhere - a stone's throw from Vemork - I
believe the distance between me and the VCFeu is actually shorter than
the one to this machine. It is in very good condition, however. The
machine was used at NTH, now NTNU, and successor to this machine, an
1100/*mumble*, was actually dumped to sea, for some environmental
reason(!).
Burroughs, I have seen nothing of, however. I have also heard of some
weird story about a rather large company the museum of sci and tech have
been talking to, which turned down a fairly major scorched-earth-style
payback, and are still storing their IBM mainframe in a warehouse. I am
not sure about the model name. Somehow, I keep thinking it ends in a
"1"... series/1? Something like that. I believe it isn't the
minicomputer with a similar name. From what I've heard, it's a bona fide
mainframe.
The whole line
of
20 years of IBM muscle computers is basically gone. The same is true
for the Burroughs and Univac machines of the same era.
It is MUCH worse for Burroughs and Univac. IBM was sold in such high numbers
that the probability of some surviving was higher. Both Burroughs and Univac
had an active "scorched earth" policies for systems in the field to keep
them out of the hands of resellers. I don't know of any Burroughs 5xxx/6xxx
systems or Univac 1100's that still exist. There is also a disproportionate number of large
scientific computers that
have survived vs business systems. There much fewer in CHM's collection.
I recently discovered a UNIVAC 9400 and 9300 in the museum of
telecommunications' warehouse here in Norway. These are machines
replicating the System/360 instruction set (of the mod. 30 and 20,
respectively). The 9300, I don't currently know much about, but speaking
for the 9400, the card punch, card reader, and line printer have been
preserved. They seem in excellent condition.
-Tore