Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.sys.pdp10 Path: nntp1.ba.best.com!news1.best.com!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!newsfeed.wli.net!newshub.northeast.verio.net!ix.netcom.com!netcom!alderson From: alderson@netcom.netcom.com (Richard M. Alderson III) Subject: Re: CompuServe ditching PDP-10s? In-Reply-To: tph@longhorn.uucp's message of 9 Sep 1998 17:24:13 GMT Message-ID: Followup-To: alt.folklore.computers,alt.sys.pdp10 Sender: alderson@netcom.netcom.com Reply-To: alderson@netcom.com Organization: NETCOM On-line services References: <35EED339.10E6@gazonk.del> <6snh70$hgv@bgtnsc02.worldnet.att.net> <35EF1A14.D4C1E30@plano.net> <6sv5cr$98s$1@daemonweed.reanimators.org> <6t6djt$oq01@eccws1.dearborn.ford.com> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 23:10:33 GMT Lines: 48 Xref: nntp1.ba.best.com alt.folklore.computers:112610 alt.sys.pdp10:4075 In article <6t6djt$oq01@eccws1.dearborn.ford.com> tph@longhorn.uucp (Tom Harrington) writes: >This is covered in the Jargon file, under "Mars". Nothing there about >CIS buying a license, though: >---------------------------------------------------------------------- >:Mars: n. A legendary tragic failure, the archetypal Hacker > Dream Gone Wrong. Mars was the code name for a family of PDP-10 > compatible computers built by Systems Concepts (now, The SC Group): > the multi-processor SC-30M, the small uniprocessor SC-25M, and the > never-built superprocessor SC-40M. Mostly just wanted to note that the SC-40 (not "M", which was the designation for a never-delivered multiprocessor configuration) was eventually delivered, in 1993. Compuserve built those once they were available. The model numbers at SC were SC-30M (a 5ft x 30in x 30in cabinet with LOTS of empty space inside), the prototype to which was delivered to LOTS the day before Hallowe'en, 1985*; the SC-25, which was the SC-30M processor in a BA23 cabinet; the SC-20 which was an SC-25 with the clock speed cut in half; and the SC-40, which was much faster than the SC-30M. I tried to buy an SC-20 for cisco Systems when I worked there briefly (1993); Mike wouldn't even send me a quote because he was afraid that the box would end up in Len's hands--even though Len parted ways with cisco in 1990. We settled for storing a KL with Bruce Kennard. *I still have pictures, of Ralph Gorin in costume, of me next to the beast, and so on. > When DEC cancelled the Jupiter project in 1983, Systems Concepts > should have made a bundle selling their machine into shops with a > lot of software investment in PDP-10s, and in fact their spring > 1984 announcement generated a great deal of excitement in the > PDP-10 world. I still have my button that reads Mars may be smaller than Jupiter, but it's a lot closer. -- Fred Wright The SC Group got out of the PDP-10 business altogether early in 1996. -- Rich Alderson Last LOTS Tops-20 Systems Programmer, 1984-1991 Current maintainer, MIT TECO EMACS (v. 170)