20 Jun
2013
20 Jun
'13
12:56 p.m.
On Thu, 20 Jun 2013, Josh Dersch wrote:
On Thu, Jun 20, 2013 at 7:36 AM, Mr Ian Primus
<ian_primus at yahoo.com> wrote:
Hard disks likely won't be an issue over time. I expect several hard drive
emulators will be available long before that becomes an issue for these
sorts of specialized applications. Even then, it is nearing the point
where hobbyist with the right tools and knowledge can repair/recreate
parts for some earlier drives, and I see no reason why this trend won't
continue.
Electrolytic capacitors will certainly go bad, but replacements should
still be available in the future. I have NOS TTL parts here that are over
30 years old that still work just fine. EPROMs might very well need to be
reprogrammed (or replaced if the quartz windows aren't properly sealed to
the IC body), but masked ROMs should be good just about indefinitely.
The main enemy of these machines and spare parts is humidity, but properly
stored, most of these parts should last for many many decades to come.
--- On Wed, 6/19/13, Josh Dersch <derschjo at
gmail.com> wrote:
Oh, I'm not doubting that they have spares (and lots of them) but by 2050
these spares will easily be pushing 70 years old. Hard drives and power
supplies will go bad just sitting there. For the logic, I wonder about the
effects of bit rot, etc. even on unused NOS spares. Someone'll have to be
there who knows how to keep an -11 running, I wonder who they've found :).
Of course, this is perhaps less of an issue if they're not running on
original hardware (simulation or a modern clone, for example). The article (and the job posting) only mentions
the software
side of things -- wonder what their plan is to keep their
PDP-11 hardware running for the next 40 years.I have to
imagine that by then parts might be hard to find:).
I would be willing to wager that they already have the parts, and have had
them for some time. Big, important, mission critical applications, you have
a complete hot spare system that's kept current with the production one,
and you have spare parts for both. And you likely bought them new, all at
the same time.
I would not be surprised at all if they've got enough parts to keep those
machines running for a hundred years, all tested, labeled, inventoried, and
ready to go. I know I would.