"Michael Black" wrote in message
...
"John R. Strohm" ) writes:

You do realize that there are people who collect these machines, and
have
been known to pay REAL MONEY for them, don't you???

These guys had this thing to the dump before I even heard about it. To tell
the truth, I'm not so sure I would have wanted to deal with posting it on
eBay, packaging, shipping the beast, all that, even if I had a chance.

Sort of to get it back to amateur radio, most people know that Wayne Green
started BYTE, and then later Kilobaud. But in the November 1972 issue of
73 (the thickest up to that time), there was an article about building
your
own computer, from logic gates etc.

Reminds me of something really great from a few years back. I was the
advisor for an electronics specialty Explorer post (basically older Boy
Scouts). Anyway, we were donated a PDP/4. This was an 18 bit machine,
interfaced to the printer and tape with a 6 bit transcode instead of ASCII.

Anyway, as we were first looking over the thing, with it's racks of cards
and beautiful, huge electrolytics in the supply, my assistant advisor taps
me on the shoulder and says "come look at this. See that rack of cards
there? I think it's the accumulator."

Sure enough, 18 cards for the accumulator, 18 cards for the program counter,
18 cards for the M register, one card per bit!

...

"xpyttl" wrote in message
...

Anyway, as we were first looking over the thing, with it's racks of cards
and beautiful, huge electrolytics in the supply, my assistant advisor taps
me on the shoulder and says "come look at this. See that rack of cards
there? I think it's the accumulator."

Sure enough, 18 cards for the accumulator, 18 cards for the program
counter,
18 cards for the M register, one card per bit!

I built my home-brew PDP-8 in a bit-slice way. Each of the main cards had
one bit of the accumulator, memory data register, memory address register
and the "other" register - 12 cards for the main data paths.

As an ancient aside, the "first minicomputer" Whirlwind at MIT was a 16-bit
bit slice machine. There was one whole 6-ft rack for each slice. Thus the
main part of the machine took 16 racks. I never saw the beast, but we (at
USAF Cambridge Research Labs) did do an experiment or two with it driving
our ground to air digital data link. That was in 1953, IIRC. But I was
VERY young back then.....

73 de bob w3otc

"xpyttl" wrote in message
...

Anyway, as we were first looking over the thing, with it's racks of cards
and beautiful, huge electrolytics in the supply, my assistant advisor taps
me on the shoulder and says "come look at this. See that rack of cards
there? I think it's the accumulator."

Sure enough, 18 cards for the accumulator, 18 cards for the program
counter,
18 cards for the M register, one card per bit!

I built my home-brew PDP-8 in a bit-slice way. Each of the main cards had
one bit of the accumulator, memory data register, memory address register
and the "other" register - 12 cards for the main data paths.

As an ancient aside, the "first minicomputer" Whirlwind at MIT was a 16-bit
bit slice machine. There was one whole 6-ft rack for each slice. Thus the
main part of the machine took 16 racks. I never saw the beast, but we (at
USAF Cambridge Research Labs) did do an experiment or two with it driving
our ground to air digital data link. That was in 1953, IIRC. But I was
VERY young back then.....

73 de bob w3otc

"Michael Black" wrote in message
...
"John R. Strohm" ) writes:

You do realize that there are people who collect these machines, and
have
been known to pay REAL MONEY for them, don't you???

These guys had this thing to the dump before I even heard about it. To tell
the truth, I'm not so sure I would have wanted to deal with posting it on
eBay, packaging, shipping the beast, all that, even if I had a chance.

Sort of to get it back to amateur radio, most people know that Wayne Green
started BYTE, and then later Kilobaud. But in the November 1972 issue of
73 (the thickest up to that time), there was an article about building
your
own computer, from logic gates etc.

Reminds me of something really great from a few years back. I was the
advisor for an electronics specialty Explorer post (basically older Boy
Scouts). Anyway, we were donated a PDP/4. This was an 18 bit machine,
interfaced to the printer and tape with a 6 bit transcode instead of ASCII.

Anyway, as we were first looking over the thing, with it's racks of cards
and beautiful, huge electrolytics in the supply, my assistant advisor taps
me on the shoulder and says "come look at this. See that rack of cards
there? I think it's the accumulator."

Sure enough, 18 cards for the accumulator, 18 cards for the program counter,
18 cards for the M register, one card per bit!

...

(Michael Black) writes:
.... most people know that Wayne Green started BYTE, and then later Kilobaud.
But in the November 1972 issue of 73 ..., there was an article about building
your own computer, from logic gates etc. It was not a construction article,
but gave quite a bit of detail on what was needed for such a time and place.
Nobody ever seems to mention that article after the fact....

Don't forget the ACS (Amateur Computer Society), which published a news-
letter from about the late 60's to the mid-70's or so (those dates are
from memory). I gave my copies to a computer museum years ago, but recall
it had construction articles, articles about members' computers, etc.

--Myron.
--
Five boxes preserve our freedoms: soap, ballot, witness, jury, and cartridge
PhD EE (retired). "Barbershop" tenor. CDL(PTX). W0PBV. (785) 539-4448
NRA Life Member and Certified Instructor (Home Firearm Safety, Rifle, Pistol)

(Michael Black) writes:
.... most people know that Wayne Green started BYTE, and then later Kilobaud.
But in the November 1972 issue of 73 ..., there was an article about building
your own computer, from logic gates etc. It was not a construction article,
but gave quite a bit of detail on what was needed for such a time and place.
Nobody ever seems to mention that article after the fact....

Don't forget the ACS (Amateur Computer Society), which published a news-
letter from about the late 60's to the mid-70's or so (those dates are
from memory). I gave my copies to a computer museum years ago, but recall
it had construction articles, articles about members' computers, etc.

--Myron.
--
Five boxes preserve our freedoms: soap, ballot, witness, jury, and cartridge
PhD EE (retired). "Barbershop" tenor. CDL(PTX). W0PBV. (785) 539-4448
NRA Life Member and Certified Instructor (Home Firearm Safety, Rifle, Pistol)

In the early/mid 60's the Science Club in my high school built a computer of
sorts out of salvaged telephone relays -- more of a binary adder than
anything else (sorry, I was too interested in 20 meters at the time!).

The Computer Museum is out in Mountain View California.

Jack
"Michael Black" wrote in message
...
"John R. Strohm" ) writes:
alt.sys.pdp8
alt.sys.pdp11
alt.sys.pdp10

"xpyttl" wrote in message
...
Talk about bad timing ....

Just a couple of days ago two friends of mine hauled a PDP/8 out to the
dump. Of course, you might not have been able to afford the power to
run
a
REAL PDP/8.

You do realize that there are people who collect these machines, and
have
been known to pay REAL MONEY for them, don't you???


A friend sold a PDP/8 on Ebay for around $3000 US (and since he's in
Canada,
it will be even better for him), just in July. It did have some odd
suffix
(and some oddity about the hardware to go with it), so I'm not sure it
that
drove the price up.

It was his first "home computer", and while he got a good deal on it (I
forget
the story, but I believe he bought it surplus in the seventies). He
was moving, so it seemed like a good time to clear it out.

Oddly, a couple of years ago I pointed him to someone periodically posting
in buy and sell newsgroups looking for such computers. When my friend
contacted him, the buyer was only willing to pay a few hundred dollars.

Sort of to get it back to amateur radio, most people know that Wayne Green
started BYTE, and then later Kilobaud. But in the November 1972 issue of
73 (the thickest up to that time), there was an article about building
your
own computer, from logic gates etc. It was not a construction article,
but
gave quite a bit of detail on what was needed for such a time and place.
Nobody ever seems to mention that article after the fact. I'm still
trying
to decide if the article had any bearing on how things went later. Did
Wayne
print it because he saw things going in that way, or did he just print
it as filler, yet when small computers came along a few years alter, it
helped to direct him to small comptuers?

Michael VE2BVW

....[snip]....
The Computer Museum is out in Mountain View, California.

There's another Computer Museum in Bozeman, Montana.
It's not nearly as big, but it contains nice stuff.

--Myron.

--
Five boxes preserve our freedoms: soap, ballot, witness, jury, and cartridge
PhD EE (retired). "Barbershop" tenor. CDL(PTX). W0PBV. (785) 539-4448
NRA Life Member and Certified Instructor (Home Firearm Safety, Rifle, Pistol)

....[snip]....
The Computer Museum is out in Mountain View, California.

There's another Computer Museum in Bozeman, Montana.
It's not nearly as big, but it contains nice stuff.

--Myron.

--
Five boxes preserve our freedoms: soap, ballot, witness, jury, and cartridge
PhD EE (retired). "Barbershop" tenor. CDL(PTX). W0PBV. (785) 539-4448
NRA Life Member and Certified Instructor (Home Firearm Safety, Rifle, Pistol)

In the early/mid 60's the Science Club in my high school built a computer of
sorts out of salvaged telephone relays -- more of a binary adder than
anything else (sorry, I was too interested in 20 meters at the time!).

The Computer Museum is out in Mountain View California.

Jack
"Michael Black" wrote in message
...
"John R. Strohm" ) writes:
alt.sys.pdp8
alt.sys.pdp11
alt.sys.pdp10

"xpyttl" wrote in message
...
Talk about bad timing ....

Just a couple of days ago two friends of mine hauled a PDP/8 out to the
dump. Of course, you might not have been able to afford the power to
run
a
REAL PDP/8.

You do realize that there are people who collect these machines, and
have
been known to pay REAL MONEY for them, don't you???


A friend sold a PDP/8 on Ebay for around $3000 US (and since he's in
Canada,
it will be even better for him), just in July. It did have some odd
suffix
(and some oddity about the hardware to go with it), so I'm not sure it
that
drove the price up.

It was his first "home computer", and while he got a good deal on it (I
forget
the story, but I believe he bought it surplus in the seventies). He
was moving, so it seemed like a good time to clear it out.

Oddly, a couple of years ago I pointed him to someone periodically posting
in buy and sell newsgroups looking for such computers. When my friend
contacted him, the buyer was only willing to pay a few hundred dollars.

Sort of to get it back to amateur radio, most people know that Wayne Green
started BYTE, and then later Kilobaud. But in the November 1972 issue of
73 (the thickest up to that time), there was an article about building
your
own computer, from logic gates etc. It was not a construction article,
but
gave quite a bit of detail on what was needed for such a time and place.
Nobody ever seems to mention that article after the fact. I'm still
trying
to decide if the article had any bearing on how things went later. Did
Wayne
print it because he saw things going in that way, or did he just print
it as filler, yet when small computers came along a few years alter, it
helped to direct him to small comptuers?

Michael VE2BVW