28 Nov
1999
28 Nov
'99
7:03 a.m.
Tim Shoppa <shoppa(a)trailing-edge.com> wrote:
Luckily, a company called SETASI did consider, and has
been selling
Massbus-compatible interfaces to "modern" drives for the past
two decades.
DEC, as a matter of fact, has been selling several SETASI-produced
units for the past several years. The SETASI Shelby has been listed
as the DEC RM06 and RP12 in the DEC Systems and Options catalog for some
time now.
See http://www.setasi.com/DECPP.html for details.
Unfortunately that web page says nothing about whether they support
18-bit mode, which is critical to making the drives work on a PDP-10.
If they're focusing on the PDP-11 and VAX market (which it appears that
they are), they may have only designed it for 16-bit mode.
And I wouldn't bet on the things being cheap to purchase, although the
reduction in operating costs compared to running an RP06 or RM05 24x7
would probably pay for it in a few years. But I doubt that RCS/RI plans
to run any of their PDP-10s 24x7.
Perhaps if the thing *does* support 18-bit mode, Setasi could be convinced
to donate one to RCS/RI.