I remember hand tuning machine code on PDP-8s and PDP-12s as actually being
fun!  Missed the opportunity to work on those large PDP-10s, but really
wanted a PDP-11 when they first came out.  A brilliantly designed machine
for the time in my estimation.

I remember back in the late sixties wanting an attache case with a screen on
top and a keyboard and dual cassette drives built in to the other half.  The
fodder of many a daydream of the time!

Pete


On 7/20/07, Jerry Fochtman <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> At 11:20 AM 7/20/2007 -0700, Pete Eggers wrote:
> >Anyone seen the precursor to disks?  Magnetic drum storage.  The control
> >hardware was much simpler because there was exactly the same number of
> bits,
> >traveling at the same speed, no matter where the data was on the drum.
>
> Yep....also fixed-head discs.  Sounded like jet engine as they were
> pressurized
> as they spun-up.
>
> >Speaking of paper tape, anyone ever have to bootstrap a machine by
> entering
> >data/address pairs through toggle switches on the front panel to load the
> >operating system's boot program off paper tape?
>
> Ah yes....having to toggle-in the instructions to built a boot-strap
> loader so
> the PDP-8 could then read the program off the paper-tape reader.
>
>
> >And then those new fangled floppy disks.  At 8 inches square, they
> certainly
> >were floppy!  Anyone use those data entry desks with built in 8" floppy
> >drives?
>
> Yeah....and the IBM-5100 series PC also used them.  Still have some of
> those
> floppy discs.
>
> I also still have some core memory planes that were taken out of a memory
> core block from the last decommissioned IBM-1800 that Exxon had in Corpus
> Christi
> around 1985 or so.
>
> I can remember in the 70''s we really took a step forward when we could
> read that tray of cards in (or paper tape) and finally store it on a
> DEC-Tape on the PDP-10.  Now we could simply had the  operator a small
> deck
> (5-10 cards) and the DEC-Tape to mount... :-)
>
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