27 Nov
2019
27 Nov
'19
9:19 a.m.
On 11/27/19 8:47 AM, Jon Elson wrote:
CDC may have had many more custom/one-of-a-kind
machines, while IBM had
tons of identical units in the field.
The "scorched earth" policy came right from the top- After it was
discovered that some "customer' had assembled a working system from
scavenged parts and then signed up for CE service, Bill Norris
reportedly hit the ceiling.
I saw one-of-a-kind systems utterly demolished. If a functional
subassembly was removed, the order was to damage it with prejudice.
I have a heatsink from a STAR-1B computer--that was the only bit in the
dumpster that remained recognizable. The stations and SBUs were
repurposed as spares for the STAR-100. CDC Sunnyvale had the only two
1Bs at the time. The STAR-65 was shipped down from Canada and
similarly demolished. The same fate befell countless peripherals and
older systems like the 160A that managed to find their way into the
facility. I've got a few oddball cordwood modules and a head from an 808
disk drive. That's about it. I used to have a platter from one, but it
was left behind in a move.
--Chuck