18 Jun
2009
18 Jun
'09
1:15 p.m.
William Donzelli wrote:
Yes, most of the big machines from the 50's and 60's, like the 7000 series, saw
a few years of life, were decommissioned and promptly scrapped. It was a
brand-new, fast-changing industry and significant portions of a warehouse would
be needed to hold onto them.
However, for a machine like the PDP-6 to have survived 20 years was remarkable
by the 80's. It would seem from the discussion that in the case of the SAIL
machine there was recognition and interest in it's historicity even then, it
was known to and around people who might appreciate it, so it is more
perplexing that it cannot now be found.
Perhaps I overstate it in saying 'there is no
story'; if this 1960's machine
was seen in substantially complete form (is that accurate?) at a DECUS event 20
years later in the 80's and hasn't been seen since, then certainly there is the
disconcerting question of what happened to it.
The 1980s were a bloodbath for these machines. 20-25 year old
computers were pretty much just looked at as metal, especially in a
corporate museum (remember, corporate museums play under different
rules, often dictated by the marketing and accounting departments). We
can lament the loss of this PDP-6, but we must remember that many
other very important machines (probably) reached extinction in the
1980s as well. Where are the members of the IBM 7000 line? The big
Burroughs machines? The Univac 1100 line?