7 Jun
2005
7 Jun
'05
1:34 p.m.
Ethan Dicks wrote:
willing to crack the case - not a problem with
something this
old - one can flip-flop a VS2000 to a MV2000 and back). With
the KA630 design (MicroVAX-II), there was no way to enforce a
marketing/licensing scheme except by limiting expansion the
hard way.
They _could_ have fiddled with the console EPROM. That's
what they di later on with the MicroVAX 3100 vs the
VAXserver 3100 etc. Easier to reverse than glue in the
backplane, but harder to reverse than flicking a jumper!
I have no idea who thought up the glue trick, but I can
only hope they got what they deserved! (Hopefully the
genius who suggested slipping NOPs into the VAX 8500
microcode soon followed the same path!)
Antonio
--
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Antonio Carlini arcarlini at iee.org