VAXstation vs MicroVAX (was Re: dammit...) - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

3 Dec 1999

...
 Thanks.  We got it c. 1989 for VAXBI development.  I
got to write the firmware
and device driver for our intellegent serial card.  I currently have a box in
the basement with 80% of the world's production of it - 8 cards out of 10.
After all the development, it was never a big seller due to the fact that the
world had moved on.   
Aha! Another VAXBI survivor! The company I used to work for did a quad
IEEE-488 interface and a MIL-STD-1553 interface. I did the firmware for
the IEEE-488 interface (imaging a Z80 looking up user-space addresses
in the page table. Fun!) and the device drivers for both interfaces. We
did hardware debug by running CP/M on one of the IEEE-488 cards; that's
right, I have a VAXBI machine that runs CP/M.

...
 At least we priced the card high enough to break even
on the production costs and the cost on the 8300, barely.  If you've ever
wondered why VAXBI SCSI cards cost so much, it's because a) they can and b)
nobody ever sold more than a handful of anything for the VAXBI except DEC. 
We sold about a hundred or so IEEE-488 interfaces. It took many years, but
it did manage to climb out of the red ink. The problem is that the bloody
thing simply will not die; I've been averaging about one inquiry a quarter
on it.

Roger Ivie
ivie(a)cc.usu.edu