7 May
2015
7 May
'15
11:03 a.m.
Comments on where the 360s went...
When I was in the used computer business in the early
80s when gold and silver did the big climb there arose a large
group of people aside from the usual scrappers, that were going
about the nation specifically targeting old 360s and earlier for scrap.
Even the scrappers that did not break the entire computers down and
process them would
sell countess containers of early computers to the Taiwanese metal
brokers that
would come over here to purchase material. yes..... shiploads of
containers...
The younger people here and those that were not in the biz back then
do not realize how many truck load after truck load were scrapped.
Knowing some of the scrappers was a good deal for me as a Computer dealer
though as a small PDP-8 or the likes did not have enough tonnage to
interest them and sometimes they would just let me have them gratis.
Hate to say how may HP 2116, 2114, and 2115 hit the process especially
in the late 80s to early 90s where there was not much market for them.
Even today, you can go down to one of the local Evil Ironworks and see
a wonderful old device on the scrap pile... there are still things coming
out of warehouses but.... in no ways like the early 80s...
Ed Sharpe Archivist for SMECC ( CEO of Computer Exchange Inc. <<long
since retired>>
In a message dated 5/7/2015 10:33:33 A.M. US Mountain Standard Time,
tmfdmike at gmail.com writes:
1. IBM would very often lease rather than sell, and take back machines
when
customers upgraded; it was obviously in their interests to control or
eliminate where possible the market in used machines.
2. Gold. A lot of gold in old IBM kit. I knew a scrap dealer in Chelmsford
UK that did nothing but break old IBM mainframes (only ever big boring grey
boxes when I was there in mid to late 1990s though!)
Mike
On 7 May 2015 13:16, "Jon Elson" <elson at pico-systems.com> wrote:
On 03/13/2015 01:32 PM, Al Kossow wrote:
> CHM was able to obtain volumes 18-20 of the IBM 2050 drawings, which are
> the microcode charts and ROS dump. I got them scanned and uploaded
> yesterday
> to http://bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/360/fe/2050
>
> This was one of the things that I had been trying to locate for a while
> now.
>
>
> Just a curious thing I've noticed. Given the historic significance,
and
the large number of machines produced, I'm kind
of amazed at the
incredibly
small number of 360's that apparently exist.
Yes, I know, any would-be collector could drag home a PDP-8 and put it in
his garage, even a whole rack mount system with an RK02 (or 3), dectape
and
paper tape reader, and still get his car in the
garage. And, the system
could be run off normal mains power.
You can't do that with a real 360 (some 360/20's were pretty small), even
a 360/30 was a pretty big box. And, you can't run a 360 off normal
residential power, either. Many of the peripherals used 3-phase motors,
and hacking the converter/inverter to run off single phase would not be a
task for any but the most experienced EE.
But, it sure is a shame that there appear to be a tiny number of machines
in existence. One list shows 15 or 16 machines, excluding the model 20.
Probably there are a couple more hidden somewhere, like the B1900 that
came
to light so recently.
As fas as I can tell, NONE of these systems is complete enough to ever
run, with the possible exception of the 360/30 at the CHM, which does
seem
to have a complement of peripherals, and maybe
control units, too.
Given the number of DEC 10's that are actually up and running, this seems
a bit of a surprise. there might be some emotional attachments that are
behind this disparity.
Anybody have some comments?
Jon