30 Mar
2010
30 Mar
'10
6:56 a.m.
Message: 11
Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 16:35:27 -0400
From: Ethan Dicks <ethan.dicks at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Using vintage computers in the classroom
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
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On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 4:14 PM, Ian King <IanK at vulcan.com> wrote:
I can't describe the reactions of those who visit my classic car show and then walk
into a barn and find a five ton 1962 mainframe working away twirling tapes, reading and
punching 80 column cards, reading and punching paper tape whilst making ghostly noises
through its built in speaker. I should maybe give them ear defenders because its so noisy
and I haven't even displayed the 600 line per minute printer working yet until I fix
it. The heat and smell of hot electronics is a bit overpowering too. I have never worked
out where the smell comes from, is it gas escaping from the components, the paxolin or the
solder/flux. I know a lot comes from the magnetic tapes, we had a walk in safe full of
tape where I worked once and when it was opened after a month or two locked up it made a
hell of a stink, like Tutenkamen's tomb.
Good luck with the course. If you ever need a Apple Mac based simulator for a 1962
mainframe with an unusual architecture get in touch.
Roger Holmes.
Owner of ICT 1301 serial number 6, the first of at least 160 to leave the factory. The
design was started in the late 1950s.
> On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 3:25 PM, Ian King
<IanK at vulcan.com> wrote:
>> We're still in our first steps, and haven't made a lot of use of
> vintage systems in the classroom (although I do like to bring along my
> PDP-8/f, just to demonstrate what a desktop computer looked like in
> 1970).
.
Sure, 10 years earlier, but there was something like that two years
earlier, and perhaps 5-6 years earlier (the PDP-8/S, though I'm not
sure what you could reasonable show off with a 4K tabletop unit since
the TTY interface is external).
Fiddly details aside, it's still cool to wheel in a "personal
computer" from the era and watch the audience gape - I've done that
with my -8/L.
-ethan