On Tue, Mar 24, 2009 at 2:45 PM, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: We ran MicroVMS 1.0 and VMS 4.1 and 4.2 on our MicroVAXen at Software Results (we bought the machines as soon as they were orderable) and used them for Qbus product development and testing. You mentioning the keys and such reminds me that I have at least one RD52 that I should image. I don't remember exactly what version is on it, but we used that machine for final acceptance testing, so there's some handy stuff on there. It's a MicroVAX-I w/4MB, an RQDX1 or RQDX2 (definitely *not* an RQDX3), and I don't know if a uVAX-I can keep a TK50 busy, but I do have a drive and controller I could try to get working on it. I think we used to mostly back it up with an RLV12 and RL02 or via RX50 or little stuff via Kermit. I have a "final backup" of our MicroVAX-II as tape images, but that's almost certainly some variant of VMS5. ISTR I used a 3rd-party tape controller and a TU80 tape drive for that one. It was a long time ago and the details are getting fuzzy. Speaking of fuzzy details, my recollection of the "key" process was that it only mattered for DECnet, and you got an install-medium-compatible "key". For our uVAX-I, it was definitely an RX50. For the uVAX-II, I *think* it was a TK50 tape. Once you "installed the key" it was in there for good; no expiration possible like with LMF. I don't know that we ever had a full key for DECnet for MicroVMS; we probably only had an 'end node' license. Even to the last days of the company, we never installed a single inch of Ethernet - all comms were serial, either sync serial (DDCMP, HASP, 3780...) or async serial (Kermit, BLAST, async DECnet). For stuff that took too long to move around via serial wires, we had RL02 controllers and packs for most of our machines. But as for VMS4 install kits, there should be some variety of standalone backup, some variety of the base VMS install, a "MUP" Mandatory Update, and probably a single (not shipped with every release) DECnet key. I don't think those keys were tied to anything specific (like a system serial number, which was identical for MicroVAXen anyway), so one copy would physically suffice for any machines you'd be setting up. All that having been said, I think I have a pile of install floppies every sector of every disk will read. I might have some time in a few weeks to start going through those boxes - at least I know exactly where they are (and what's in them since I *did* label them!) -ethan

On Tue, Mar 24, 2009 at 3:30 PM, Paul Koning <Paul_Koning at dell.com> wrote: I wouldn't be so certain - my experience is that the the way the TK50 works, you can store *up to* 95MB per tape *if* you can keep the silos full. A MicroVAX-I is a slooooow beasty. There's no problem with the Qbus itself, but my concern would be that system overhead, interrupt latency, RQDX performance, etc., could be bad enough that the OS just couldn't fill tape buffers fast enough. Of course, trying to back up 30 MB onto a 95MB tape doesn't require perfect performance. Thinking about it, perhaps it's worth the effort to use Standalone Backup - that should minimize any OS effects on backup speeds. Once the tape is written, ISTR the TK50 will back the tape up as necessary to extract what's on it. It's writing that you _must_ optimize. Comments from others with TK50 experience welcome, but that's how I remember it from c. 1986. -ethan

At 4:15 PM -0400 3/24/09, Paul Koning wrote: Isn't the PDP-11/73 about twice as fast as a MicroVAX I? Remember the MicroVAX I is only 0.3 VUPS. Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com (primary) | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet) | Classic Computer Collector | +----------------------------------+----------------------------+ | Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, | | PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum. | | http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/ |

On Tue, Mar 24, 2009 at 4:12 PM, <arcarlini at iee.org> wrote: Ah... that sounds familiar. Of course, who would consider trying to get 64 users on a 4MB MicroVAX I - that's just not gonna happen. A 9MB MicroVAX II might be able to handle it if there wasn't a lot of memory-intensive activity. Sounds right, but I don't recall fiddling with that much. We didn't do clustering so I have no experience with that. I think that was pretty much the point. -ethan