23 Jun
2015
23 Jun
'15
2:33 p.m.
Yes I noticed the rarther fancy panels with the edgewise meters.
I'm begining to wonder if they might be for monitoring private comms
circuits.
Sort of a comms test box.
The meters would be right for signal to noise and the row of buttons at
the bottom for channel to monitor selection.
On 23/06/2015 22:11, Jules Richardson wrote:
On 06/22/2015 11:43 PM, Christian Kennedy wrote:
I think the hint is on the back. This is a story
of Delaine Donohue
retiring from D&B where he created and ran the National Business
Information Center and the Central Data Collection Group between the
early 70s and early 80s. He retired in ?89, so it?s not unreasonable to
assume 80?s vintage in the context of D&B ? although the drives do
suggest earlier rather than later in the decade.
"If it ain't broke, don't fix it" etc. - maybe there was significant
risk in replacing an old but reliable system.
so I suppose it?s
possible that these are comm processors ? although IIRC most of the
original NCSS packet stuff was PDP-11 based.
To me it looks like those are pairs of analog moving-coil meters on
the fronts, either side of the blinkenlights, which seems a little odd
(I mean sure, maybe one such meter for checking/monitoring power
inputs, but even then I'm surprised it would be right there on the
front panels). It makes me wonder if these aren't some form of
multi-channel data logging devices, rather than a general-purpose
computer.