PDP-12 Restoration at the RICM

[Jon Elson]

On 05/14/2015 10:28 AM, Lyle Bickley wrote:
> On Wed, 13 May 2015 19:37:57 -0600
> Eric Smith <spacewar at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> >From the web page:
>>      "so it actually has two processors"
>>
>> Is that true? I haven't had time to make a detailed study of the
>> PDP-12 logic design, but my understanding was that unlike the LINC-8,
>> which basically was two separate processors mashed together, the
>> PDP-12 was a single integrated processor with two modes (PDP-8 and
>> LINC). I was told that there were some commonalities that were taken
>> advantage of, such that merging it resulted in reduction of the total
>> logic necessary as compared to the LINC-8.
> I owned a PDP-12 for years. I bought it directly from DEC shortly after
> it went out of production for $3,000!
>
> My PDP-12 had 12Kw of RAM, an RF08 (2x256K) disk, dual TU56 Linctapes,
> TC08 and TU55, ASR-33 and ADM-3 terminals, 9-track reel to reel mag
> tape. In addition, because I wanted really high speed paper tape, I
> created an interface to a Tally 1000cps PT reader and high speed punch.
>
> I was the last official DECUS Coordinator for the PDP-12, so my PDP-12
> was used to copy the contents of the DECUS PDP-8 and PDP-12 libraries to
> all of the different media using my PDP-12.
Ahh, that explains all the drives!

I was the local DECUS librarian in the St. Louis area, 
mostly for VAX stuff.  I got some CDC Keystone 9-track
1600/6250 tape drives at a surplus shop, and did the tape 
copying in my home basement.

I wrote a program that could read a tape and put it in a 
container file format on disk, and then spool off copies to 
tape at full streaming speed.

Jon