PDP-11

[Adrian Graham]

On 11/05/2016 23:08, "Ethan Dicks" <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Wed, May 11, 2016 at 5:24 PM, Adrian Graham
> <witchy at binarydinosaurs.co.uk> wrote:
>>> Some others had a PRO as their console.  Don't remember which models
>>> specifically.
>> The 8{3|5}50s our biggest customer used had Pro380 VAX CONSOLES
> 
> Not the 82xx/83xx, but the larger 85xx, 87xx and 88xx... Machines with
> a Nautilus bus, mostly.  The 8200|8250|8300|8350 were more like a
> VAX-11/750 where the console "processor" was embedded into the CPU.

My memory's getting skewed with age, clearly. I can remember RKG's (Royal
Kingdom of Geordies) finest 2 engineers upgrading the 8350s to 8550s and the
passage of time has me convinced it was 'only' a backplane swap. I was
purely a code monkey back then. One thing that definitely happened was the
MD of this company was going to have his new VAXen removed again because
they didn't have blinkenlights.
 
> Nope.  TSX-11 was not a DEC product.  Pro350s and Pro380s (Pro325
> didn't have a hard disk) usually ran P/OS, an RSX derivative for the
> Professional series.  You could also get RT-11 for the Pro, as well as
> VENIX, but when used as a VAX console, it was P/OS and some
> menus/assets for being a console.  It's not hard to repurpose them.

Aaah P/OS! Yes, I think it's all the recent chat on here about TSX-11 that
had me thinking that's what was running. The box of floppies I got might
contain P/OS disks....Tomorrow I'll grab the RCD socket from the kitchen and
plug said console in and will be prepared to be amazed if the RD51 spins up.

-- 
Adrian/Witchy
Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator
Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer
collection?