16 Nov
1999
16 Nov
'99
3:02 a.m.
On Tue, 16 Nov 1999, Truthan,Larry wrote:
I have a MicroVax I
I have been able to communicate to it using a terminal emulator into one of
its serial ports.
I believe it has VMS 4.X? loaded, But it has been too long since I last had
it running. I was able to list devices, But now I forget the login process.
I have always wanted to get more mainstream with a version Unix for this
Box. What can you tell me of freeBSD Unix? What is it's distribution media?
This unit has the 5.25 floppies, which I dont recall ever being able to boot
(Only because I don't know VMS, nor do I know what programs or utilities I
have on Floppy that are "Bootable").
Where do I start? Learn VMS or Learn hardware requirement for, and get
FreeBSD?
FreeBSD is primarily a PC operating system. You're probably thinking of
NetBSD, which runs on (among some 20 other processors) VAXen.
However, the MicroVAX I cpu is not yet supported by NetBSD. Its internal
architecture is quite a bit different from most of the other "mainstream" VAX
implementations, and the kernel-hacking folks in the NetBSD/vax world haven't
had much chance to work on it yet.
Your best bet, if you're sure you want to dump VMS, is to get ahold of
Ultrix. That's a DEC Unix product that'll run pretty well on that machine.
-Dave McGuire