To all with interest in IBM 7090

Well what do you know! I thought my radical views would attract some adverse comments. Instead I get agreement from a well known and established collector. As you know I am ex-DEC and therefore concentrate on that make. My goal is to restore back to running order as they left the factory. Whilst many computers and peripherals are well designed and look quite good the essential point is what they can do and have done. It?s the fact that the same machine can be used for a myriad of tasks. This was the key point in Alan Turing's 1936 'On Computable Numbers'. So two identical computers sitting alongside each but turned off are the same thing. Turn them on and one controls traffic lights and the other holds medical records. Therein lies the reason to restore to working condition and not to static display or store them. I cannot see why known hobby restorers are never approached by museums saying 'We have an XYZ123 system in store. If you restore it to working order then it will go on display with a small card saying restored by Joe Bloggs or whoever.' This reverses the donation flow, does not deplete the private collection stock and brings more items into display at little or no cost. Regards ? Rod Smallwood -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Tony Duell Sent: 07 August 2012 20:57 To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Subject: Re: To all with interest in IBM 7090 That strikes me as a low estiamte. attract I have a book on clock repair which starts out by saying that just about the worst thing you can do with an old clock (not a'famous maker') is tyo give it to a museum where it will never tick again. FWIW, I did not write said book, and I read it after I had formed my own simialr views... know I've dontated a few artefacts and regretted it .They were never displayed, certainly never restored. In fact they were probably lost. -tony