1 Dec
2010
1 Dec
'10
11:38 a.m.
On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 8:01 AM, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote:
At 7:30 AM -0800 12/1/10, Gene Buckle wrote:
What are people's opinions of Personal Alpha
(http://www.stromasys.ch/hardware-virtualization-solutions/charon-axp/downlo…
Mark
I'd love to have another VAX, but I can't afford to feed it. Emulation
would be nice. :)
Replacement HW costs are definitely going up. ?I managed to score a pair of
Compaq XP1000's (Alpha 21264 500Mhz & 667Mhz) at the low point in their
value. ?One now has a dead power supply, and last I checked XP1000's go for
big bucks (not sure about the PS's). ?I assume drives are getting harder to
find, but I have a large stash. I have several older Alpha's dating back to
a DEC3000/300LX. ?My VAX hardware is a lot sparser, flakier, and my drive
options more limited (plus I don't want to run a Q-bus system 24x7 which
limits me even more).
Still the biggest roadblock on keeping the stuff running is the cost of
electricity and cooling. ?That's what caused me to power down MONK, which
had been running for over a decade in one form or another.
There are several emulation solutions, I'd recommend looking at SIMH first.
?I'm thinking of trying it on a Mini-ITX box.
Zane 
1 Dec
1 Dec
11:48 a.m.
Mark Davidson [mdavidson1963 at gmail.com] wrote:
What are people's opinions of Personal Alpha
(http://www.stromasys.ch/hardware-virtualization-solutions/cha
ron-axp/download-personalalpha/)?
(Must be the CHARON people right?)
My view is that if it's free for personal use then I'll have to
give it a go and put it to one side for the day when I don't have
a real Alpha (or N) that still work(s) :-)
Thanks for the heads up.
Antonio
11:57 a.m.
On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 11:48 AM, <arcarlini at iee.org> wrote:
Mark Davidson [mdavidson1963 at gmail.com] wrote:
Antonio---
Yes, that's the Charon people and it is free for personal use. I use
it on my Windows box to run one of my Alpha Hobbyist licenses (the
real Alpha hardware is waiting for me to obtain a bigger office).
You're welcome. :)
Mark
What are people's opinions of Personal Alpha
(http://www.stromasys.ch/hardware-virtualization-solutions/cha
ron-axp/download-personalalpha/)?
(Must be the CHARON people right?)
My view is that if it's free for personal use then I'll have to
give it a go and put it to one side for the day when I don't have
a real Alpha (or N) that still work(s) :-)
Thanks for the heads up.
Antonio
12:03 p.m.
Mark Davidson [mdavidson1963 at gmail.com] wrote:
Yes, that's the Charon people and it is free for
personal
use. I use it on my Windows box to run one of my Alpha
Hobbyist licenses (the real Alpha hardware is waiting for me to
obtain a bigger office).
You're welcome. :)
Apparently not:
--------------------------
This web page is not found.
No web page was found for the web address:
ftp://tao:er65tza4 at ftp.stromasys.com/PersonalAlpha-2.0.17.zip
More information on this error
-----------------------------
sniff :-(
12:09 p.m.
On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 12:03 PM, <arcarlini at iee.org> wrote:
Mark Davidson [mdavidson1963 at gmail.com] wrote:
Hmm... that used to work because I'm a happy user. I'll drop a note
to see what's going on.
Mark
Yes, that's the Charon people and it is free
for personal
use. ?I use it on my Windows box to run one of my Alpha
Hobbyist licenses (the real Alpha hardware is waiting for me to
obtain a bigger office).
You're welcome. :)
Apparently not:
--------------------------
This web page is not found.
No web page was found for the web address:
ftp://tao:er65tza4 at ftp.stromasys.com/PersonalAlpha-2.0.17.zip 
1:45 p.m.
On Wed, 1 Dec 2010, Mark Davidson wrote:
What are people's opinions of Personal Alpha
(http://www.stromasys.ch/hardware-virtualization-solutions/charon-axp/downlo…
I have two major issues with it. One is it requires Windows, the other is
that it is restricted to 128MB of RAM. I honestly can't survive on an Alpha
with so little RAM. I could sqeeze into about 256MB, but realistically I
need 512MB or more. I forget if my current system has 2GB or 4GB. I'd also
be concerned about disk limitations, but could survive with those. The RAM
really is the big one, since that is the realistic minimum for OpenVMS 7.2
if you're running DECwindows. DEC claimed you could do with 64MB, and based
on my experience I disagree.
I think I could better survive in the limitations imposed by SIMH (namely
that it's a VAX emulator).
Sadly work seems to have stopped on the following:
http://www.es40.org/Homepage as the main developer is now working on a
commercial emulator. However, they offer what looks like it might be a
better alternative to Personal Alpha.
http://www.migrationspecialties.com/FreeAXP.html
I also need to look into their AvantiFlex option, as it looks like I might
actually do what I need, at a price I can almost afford. The problem being
I'm not sure if there is an annual fee. But a base price of $500 + $50 for
adding 512MB RAM makes it interesting. Sadly it still requires Windows. :-(
Zane
2:01 p.m.
If you'd rather run on lower-power hardware, I'm about to test and
sell an AlphaStation 500/500, a PWS500, and an LX164 board. I don't
remember how much RAM the PWS has, but the other 2 have 384MB each.
Also, somebody here in Texas was interested in the rackmount AS2100.
I can't find that email, so if you still want it, I've dug it out.
Let me know off-list when you can come get it. :)
Why, you ask, am I ditching all my cool AXP gear? My rx2600 (2x
1.5GHz ia64, 10GB RAM, SAS3080 SATA) takes care of all my VMS needs
these days....
</gloat>
Doc
On 12/1/10 3:45 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote:
On Wed, 1 Dec 2010, Mark Davidson wrote:
What are people's opinions of Personal Alpha
(http://www.stromasys.ch/hardware-virtualization-solutions/charon-axp/downlo…
I have two major issues with it. One is it requires Windows, the other is
that it is restricted to 128MB of RAM. I honestly can't survive on an Alpha
with so little RAM. I could sqeeze into about 256MB, but realistically I
need 512MB or more. I forget if my current system has 2GB or 4GB. I'd also
be concerned about disk limitations, but could survive with those. The RAM
really is the big one, since that is the realistic minimum for OpenVMS 7.2
if you're running DECwindows. DEC claimed you could do with 64MB, and based
on my experience I disagree.
I think I could better survive in the limitations imposed by SIMH (namely
that it's a VAX emulator).
Sadly work seems to have stopped on the following:
http://www.es40.org/Homepage as the main developer is now working on a
commercial emulator. However, they offer what looks like it might be a
better alternative to Personal Alpha.
http://www.migrationspecialties.com/FreeAXP.html
I also need to look into their AvantiFlex option, as it looks like I might
actually do what I need, at a price I can almost afford. The problem being
I'm not sure if there is an annual fee. But a base price of $500 + $50 for
adding 512MB RAM makes it interesting. Sadly it still requires Windows. :-(
Zane
2:13 p.m.
On 12/1/10 4:01 PM, Doc Shipley wrote:
If you'd rather run on lower-power hardware,
I'm about to test and sell
an AlphaStation 500/500, a PWS500, and an LX164 board. I don't remember
how much RAM the PWS has, but the other 2 have 384MB each.
Also, somebody here in Texas was interested in the rackmount AS2100. I
can't find that email, so if you still want it, I've dug it out. Let me
know off-list when you can come get it. :)
Why, you ask, am I ditching all my cool AXP gear? My rx2600 (2x 1.5GHz
ia64, 10GB RAM, SAS3080 SATA) takes care of all my VMS needs these days....
</gloat>
Urk! Sorry about the top post!
Doc
10:57 p.m.
On 02/12/2010, at 6:38 AM, Mark Davidson wrote:
What are people's opinions of Personal Alpha
(http://www.stromasys.ch/hardware-virtualization-solutions/charon-axp/downlo…
Great way of running OpenVMS without powering up real hardware (which is inevitably
noisier than my laptop). Pity it's only Windows - would be nice if it ran natively on
Linux or Mac OS-X.
I do have it running under Xen on my Linux server - in fact on four virtual machines
forming a cluster. I used it a while back for a customer presentation on Availability
Manager - much easier to stop a virtual machine :-)
Huw Davies | e-mail: Huw.Davies at kerberos.davies.net.au
Melbourne | "If soccer was meant to be played in the
Australia | air, the sky would be painted green"
5179
days inactive
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8 comments
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participants (5)
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arcarlini＠iee.org -
doc＠vaxen.net -
healyzh＠aracnet.com -
huw.davies＠mail.vsm.com.au -
mdavidson1963＠gmail.com