Perhaps this belongs on alt.folklore.something, being so nostalgic (the
newcomers to the list often complain) but I love the occasional diversion.
 
UTC had the distinction of getting the first field delivery of the final
phase of the 2000 - the 2000/Access - very much the system seen in the web
page so generously provided by a previous reader.  Once the order was set,
we obtained a demo account on Southern College's 2000/F for playing around
(they are now southern.edu, we have some readers from there, and John
Beckett is a legend in these parts as another HP fanatic; also home to John
Kendall who developed some "interesting" plug-in patches to the 2000/Access
OS to give you some incredible capabilities (he hot-wired a peek/poke type
ability into one of the functions (tim()?) for an A000 user).  The premier
feature of the 2000/Access was the ability to "access" ASCII files - tape,
printer, punch, card reader, etc.  Plus the RJE capability (we used it on
a grand scale).  I remember Dave James and Ernie Bailey showing up one day
in baby-blue "HP-logo" coveralls, looking like they belonged on a NASA team,
to install the beast.  Dave took a look inside the crates and said "So THAT
is an Access!" and we were not terribly amused.  Both went on to do great
things with HP but I lost track of them and have no idea of where they are
now.  I think they scratched the coveralls idea shortly thereafter :-)
 
The 2000 was an ideal educational institution's machine in it's day.  We had
ours from day one until the end of it's support life.  The parts went in
many different directions, but the original racks/cabinets still exist in
our machine room, housing modems, our six DTC48s, and in fact, the Telco mux
that feeds our internet connection.  So a little piece of the old 2000 is
still active and a part of you receiving this message.  For that matter,
every message sent to/from the 3000-L list has passed through the chassis
of a faithful and loyal 2000 system.  We will never surplus those cabinets
as long as I'm on staff, unless I bring it home :-)
 
Jeff Kell <[log in to unmask]>  Almost brings a tear to my eye...
 
PS - To maintain my 3000 crusade, I should point out that a relatively
trivial migration path was provided *even then* to convert 2000/Access
Basic code to Basic/3000 code, and we moved over a *lot* of stuff.  UTC
converted the 2000 contributed library, much of the CAI stuff from the 2000,
and even stuff from CONDUIT (don't remember the acronym, it was another
source of contributed Basic code).  Not only that, but the 3000 offered us
the BASICOMP compiler!