14 Jan
2009
14 Jan
'09
1:46 p.m.
From: Ethan Dicks
Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 12:15 PM
On Wed, Jan 14, 2009 at 3:05 PM, Pontus <pontus at
update.uu.se>> wrote:
> The Toad is small and cute, even cats like it, not
much need for raised
> floor, don't know about power though.
That is small and cute. I worked next to some Systems
Concepts
machines at the Hilliard, OH, data center in 2003 - my stuff was a
wall of Alpha CPUs and disk, several rows away from the 36-bit
hardware, but I still had to walk by it every day. I _think_ it was a
small wall of SC30s, but I could be wrong. I was told that because of
how CompuServe was carved up between MCI/Worldcom and AOL,
MCI/Worldcom was still running billing jobs on the 36-bit machines and
that more than one attempt to re-write that stuff had ended with a
lack of success. No idea if they are _still_ running it or not, but a
replacement was not in sight by late 2003.
Those were SC40s. Mike and Stewart licensed CompuServe to build their
own for a discounted fee (IIRC 40% of list).
Around 2001 we got a call from someone in one of those offices, but by
then we were completely out of the business of selling Toad-1 systems.
Too bad, because the CEO of CIS blew off a meeting (with people waiting
in his outer office) the day of the NT announcement.
The Toad does look great, though. For now though,
like most of the
list, I'll be getting my 36-bit fix via klh10 and the graces of Paul
Allen.
I occasionally check in on the 10-on-an-FPGA projects
from time to
time, but I can't allocate a lot of money to that aspect of the hobby,
so I sit on the sidelines and see how they are coming along.
For what I do (Zork regression testing for ZDungeon),
I don't really
need to own real 36-bit hardware, just an account is enough, so that's
what I'm doing. I still wouldn't mind owning real 36-bit hardware,
but unless it was some sort of rescue, I don't see it happening in my
future.
Happy to help!
Rich Alderson
Server Engineer, PDPplanet Project
Vulcan, Inc.
505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900
Seattle, WA 98104
mailto:RichA at vulcan.com
(206) 342-2239
(206) 465-2916 cell