MicroVAX I

[Josh Dersch]

On 8/14/2018 2:12 PM, Ethan Dicks via cctalk wrote:

> On Sun, Aug 12, 2018 at 11:36 PM, robertbeauchamp33--- via cctalk
> <cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
>> My mother is moving and her spouse has a MicroVax I he bought new back in 1984 for some crazy amount. I don’t see this model listed in your chart? Can you tell me if there is any value to this machine? He also has two original monitors.
> There is some value, since it's in a BA23 and _is_ a VAX, even as slow
> as can be.  They are somewhat uncommon because they were only
> available for a couple of years unlike most other DEC machines.
> Having used one in the mid-80s when they were brand new (and $10,000),
> they are quite slow and painful and limited to, I think, various
> versions of MicroVMS and VMS 4.x, depending on disk size (MicroVMS
> fits on a 30MB disk when the full version would not).  I don't recall
> if there is any support for them in VMS 5.x - the max RAM is 4MB
> (unlike later Qbus VAXen, the RAM is _on_ the Qbus) but one could
> easily put a newer disk controller in there other than the RQDX1 and a
> larger disk.

Be aware that most (if not all?) QBus SCSI controllers appear to be 
incompatible with the MicroVAX I.  I'm not entirely sure why this is, 
but none of the Emulex, CMD, or Dilog controllers I've tried are listed 
as compatible with the system -- they all state compatibility with the 
II and later .I've tried using them in my MicroVAX I with no success.  
VMS fails to boot, and Ultrix kernel panics.  Not to hijack the thread, 
but does anyone have any idea why this might be? I'd like to get the 
system doing something interesting and not having to rely on very old 
MFM disks would be nice...

- Josh

> As shipped, though, I don't think the uVAX-I arrived
> with a large enough disk for VMS 5.0, at least not without a very
> manual, very painful install.
>
> Where is this?  (city?  country?  continent?)
>
> I still have the one from work from 1984 so I'm not in the market, but
> people here do want to know.
>
> -ethan
>