Panaplex display history

tony duell ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk
Mon Jun 1 11:07:41 CDT 2015


> 
> 
> Thinking about it, I seem to remember seeing some picture of an 11/70
> with bulbs as well, but all 11/70 machines I've seen or worked on had
> LEDs, so I suspect they might have had bulbs initially as well.

DEC used little modules containing an LED and series resistor that were 
the same size as the bi-pin T1+3/4 bulbs used earlier. In a CPU panel you
had to clip out the pre-heat resistors, for obvious reasons. My 8/e is like that,
although I think some 8/e's had bulbs. I've seen RK05s with bulbs and 
RK05s with LED modules. My 11/45 (I forget the serial number, it's early, perhaps
315) certainly has bulbs.

Thinking about it, I find it surprising that on later disk drives -- RL's, RK07s, 
R80s etc, they used bulbs and not LEDs. By that date LEDs were easily available and
reliable. 

-tony


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