28 Nov
2006
28 Nov
'06
10:24 a.m.
In article <456C2FCE.4000102 at yahoo.co.uk>,
Jules Richardson <julesrichardsonuk at yahoo.co.uk> writes:
Chuck Guzis wrote:
I'm surprised that no mention has been made
of the Soviet-era
machines as being collectible. I seem to recall that Bulgaria was a
center of Iron Curtain big iron production at one time.
Does much of the big stuff survive intact - and if it does, is there enough
supporting documentation and software around to make it interesting for the
private collector, though? From browsing around sites of European collectors it
appears that some
of this stuff has survived. Fortunately, since they are things
like
PDP-11 clones you don't necessarily need docs for them specifically;
the PDP-11 doc sets will get you by. At least that's what I
understand from reading about it. It might be a little different when
you saw the machines in the flesh. However, since their goal was to
essentially rip-off successful western designs, it would be rather
moot if they weren't software compatible so that they could steal the
software as well. So I'm guessing that the hardware is pretty much a
straight clone.
I have no idea what the actual status is, but my guess
would be that most big
old machines were scrapped for useful parts long ago - [...]
You'd be surprised what happens in an inefficient market like the
former eastern bloc countries. I saw an episode of Modern Marvels
where NASA was using a number of Soviet era rocket engines from the
early 60s. An engineer on the Soviet project had sequestered them in
a warehouse for 40+ years instead of destroying them as ordered at the
time. My feeling is that the older stuff has more of a chance
surviving in inefficient markets than in efficient market economies.
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