5 Dec
2006
5 Dec
'06
8:45 a.m.
At 1:27 AM +1300 12/6/06, Ethan Dicks wrote:
It has been my experience that the Viking controllers were *very*
common and rebadged by at least a couple companies. All of my main
PDP-11's are using Viking QDT & UDT controllers.
I don't know either... I've only ever used
sleds with a BA23.
I haven't tried it myself, but it may be possible to fabricate
something close enough to work with ordinary shop tools and a sheet of
plexiglass/perspex. Has anyone on the list ever tried to make DEC
drive sleds from scratch?
I might be getting it confused with a 3rd party chassis, but I'm
pretty sure I've seen a metal drive sled, rather than the standard
DEC Plastic sleds. At the same time, getting the thickness right is
what will cause problems I suspect.
The SCSI
controllers are relatively hard to come by, but the Emulex DQ07
(iirc) seems to be one of the most common, and is the one I have.
Viking and CMD controllers were also common, IIRC. Unless you have a small quantity of ESDI drives,
I'd suggest you be on
the lookout for a Qbus SCSI controller. They aren't usually under
$250 US, but even at that price (if it hasn't gone up recently), the
ability to use more modern drives is rather nice unless you are more
interested in a 100% vintage arrangement from before the time of SCSI
(by the time the 11/83 came around, SCSI drives weren't that rare on
DEC machines, but the controllers never were inexpensive).
If he looks for a ESDI controller, I'd recommend the Webster WQESD/04
controller. Personally it is the one non-SCSI 3rd party controller
I'd want to run (I did for several years).
2BSD is a nice choice if you want Unix. RT-11 was
common for smaller
systems, and RSX-11/M and RSTS were common for larger configurations.
If you aren't married to Unix, RT-11 is simple enough to pick up
quickly, especially if you have much MS-DOS or CP/M experience. I
went the other way - RT-11 first, then CP/M... made learning to get
around on a Kaypro a snap.
I've found one of the advantages of SCSI is that it's easy to use
drive trays to run multiple OS's. RT-11 is very nice. Somehow
either RSX-11M or RSX-11M+ seem a bit more appropriate for the system
in question. I'm not sure I'd recommend RSTS/E as a first OS.
BTW, another advantage of SCSI is attaching a CD-ROM drive, which can
make installing an OS easier.
Zane
--
| Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator |
| healyzh at aracnet.com (primary) | OpenVMS Enthusiast |
| MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet) | Classic Computer Collector |
+----------------------------------+----------------------------+
| Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, |
| PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum. |
| http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/ |