Decmate

On Sun, Mar 16, 2008 at 01:05:32PM -0400, Steve Shumaker wrote: Sounds like a good price - the keyboard is a standard VT100 keyboard, possibly one with WPS keycaps. Electrically, though, it's standard. You might be able to get someone to send you the missing caps, or even an entire keyboard inexpensively. The "VT100" _is_ the CPU... or rather, the CPU (and possibly some I/O cards) is mounted inside a VT100 shell, next to the CRT. It was sold as a word processor, but it's an IM6120-microprocessor-based PDP-8. You should be able to run OS/278 on it, a slightly modified version of OS/8 (the console device (03/04) behaves slightly different on the DECmates than on a "real" PDP-8, so there are a few minor changes to the console handler). Personally, I think it's worth saving and a collectable. I have a DECmate I with only one set of drives in the pedestal that I'd love to expand to two sets of drives (you can dismantle a rack-mount RX02 and install it in the pedestal, but there's some internal cabling to add to get the signals out and in the correct mechanical format), and I'd really love to run across the RL278 interface and hang an RL02 off of mine. My DECmate I does have one interesting, and I think rare, feature - a side desk - there's a clip that mounts on the pedestal where the keyboard tray normally hangs. It's at the right height for a special desktop that only has one side panel. You turn the pedestal so the drives face you, mount the clip, then mount the desktop to the clip. I've been using mine for a computer desk for over 15 years (since I found the desk part and the clip at the local university surplus). I've only ever run WPS on my DECmate I, but when I get home, one of my projects is going to be to go through my boxes of DEC floppies and image what I can. IIRC, if you have an OS/278 boot disk already, the DECmate I should make a nice platform for making and sending floppy images over the serial port to a nearby PeeCee. It's a lot more portable than my -8/a or my -8/e, making it easier to bring the computer to the floppies than vice-versa (I happen to have a MINC-11 with a desk-top-packaged RX02 within cable-reach of my floppy storage, so it's doubly convenient). If someone local to me offered me a DECmate I for $50, keyboard or none, I'd drop what I was doing and get in my car. It's a nice compact package and probably a little less common these days than a DECmate II or III (which are similar internally, with the largest functional difference being RX02s vs RX50s, though it's _possible_ to hook RX02s to a DECmate II if you have the rare interface do to so). -ethan -- Ethan Dicks, A-333-S Current South Pole Weather at 16-Mar-2008 at 17:29 Z South Pole Station PSC 468 Box 400 Temp -70.6 F (-57.0 C) Windchill -109.4 F (-78.6 C) APO AP 96598 Wind 12.7 kts Grid 35 Barometer 673.0 mb (10893 ft) Ethan.Dicks at usap.gov http://penguincentral.com/penguincentral.html