From: kepa@kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi (Aki Pursiainen) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Beginner's questions about PDP 11/24 Date: 1 Jul 1998 19:30:58 GMT Organization: kepanoid - Kepa's komputer Lines: 29 Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi X-Newsreader: slrn (0.9.3.2 UNIX) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!news-fra.maz.net!news-lond.gip.net!news-stkh.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!newsfeed1.funet.fi!news.funet.fi!news.clinet.fi!news.jmp.fi!kepa Hello, o wise old men! I, a child of the PC generation, am about to aquire my first minicomputer, a PDP 11/24, and have a couple of questions: 1. Is there anything special I should be aware of when moving it? Does it survive transportation in horizontal position? 1b. What are the exact physical dimensions of the machine? (Did it come in different physical configurations? There is a picture of this particular machine at http://cs.joensuu.fi/~jlind/pdp/ The text is in Finnish only.) 2. It does not come with a console terminal. I, however, have a couple of Digital VT-220s. What are the correct settings for the terminal? 3. How do I boot the machine? It probably has RSX in it. 4. Is there a beginners' guide to RSX anywhere online? I realize this is something completely different from everything I'm used to in the PC world and I'm sure this will be an interesting experience. Thank you in advance! -- Kepa (Aki Pursiainen) kepa@kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi http://kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi/ ###### From: ard@p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Beginner's questions about PDP 11/24 Date: 1 Jul 1998 23:21:49 +0100 Organization: P850 User Group Message-ID: <6necpt$15a@p850ug1.demon.co.uk> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: p850ug1.demon.co.uk X-NNTP-Posting-Host: p850ug1.demon.co.uk:158.152.97.199 X-Trace: news.demon.co.uk 899333910 nnrp-08:12167 NO-IDENT p850ug1.demon.co.uk:158.152.97.199 X-Complaints-To: abuse@demon.net X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2] Lines: 34 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!newsfeed.ecrc.net!newsfeed.nacamar.de!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!news.demon.co.uk!demon!p850ug1.demon.co.uk!not-for-mail Aki Pursiainen (kepa@kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi) wrote: : Hello, o wise old men! : I, a child of the PC generation, am about to aquire my first minicomputer, a : PDP 11/24, and have a couple of questions: : 1. Is there anything special I should be aware of when moving it? Does it : survive transportation in horizontal position? The 11/24 _CPU_ is pretty solid, and can be carried or stored just about any way up you want. The only thing to watch out for is that you don't damage the switches on the front by standing it on them. There are 2 standard boxes for the 11/24 - both rackmout. One is 3U (5.25"), and is not to heavy. The other is 6U (10.5"), and really needs 2 people to move it. Of course that box goes into a 19" rack cabinet with other peripherals The delicate bits are the peripherals. I've got no idea what drives you're getting, but a lot of them require you to lock the heads (and maybe the spindle), fit clamp kits, etc before moving them. If you don't, you'll need a new HDA (Head Disk Assembly - the sealed bit of a winchester), or new heads (on a demountable, like an RL02). Such drives should be transported flat if at all possible. IMHO you should take everything out of the rack and move the units separately. An empty rack is heavy enough to move about. That way you can be sure that the drives are locked, etc. I've got over 10 PDP11 systems here, and not one was moved fully assembled. -tony ###### From: jmfbahciv@aol.com Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Beginner's questions about PDP 11/24 Date: Thu, 02 Jul 98 10:35:02 GMT Organization: UltraNet Communications, Inc. Lines: 22 Message-ID: <6nfr39$n7u$1@ligarius.ultra.net> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: d11.dial-11.mbo.ma.ultra.net X-Complaints-To: abuse@ultra.net X-Ultra-Time: 2 Jul 1998 11:31:53 GMT X-Newsreader: News Xpress Version 1.0 Beta #4 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!feed2.news.erols.com!erols!news.ultranet.com!d11 In article , kepa@kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi (Aki Pursiainen) wrote: > > Hello, o wise old men! Ahem....:-) > >I, a child of the PC generation, am about to aquire my >first minicomputer, a >PDP 11/24, and have a couple of questions: I don't know the answers to your questions and I don't know what an 11/24 is (my expertise was with the big ones). However, I do have a softcover book called "processor handbook" for the PDP-11/ 05,10,35,40 flavors of processors. You might try to acquire one (although I wouldn't have the faintest idea where to look for one other than in the boxes of old farts). /BAH Sigh! - Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail. ###### From: rwaltman@bellatlantic.net (Roberto Waltman) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.sys.pdp11 Subject: Re: Beginner's questions about PDP 11/24 Date: Thu, 02 Jul 1998 23:09:16 GMT Organization: . Lines: 66 Message-ID: <35a812ec.35291476@news5.bellatlantic.net> References: <6nfr39$n7u$1@ligarius.ultra.net> Reply-To: rwaltman@bellatlantic.net NNTP-Posting-Host: client-151-198-133-30.bellatlantic.net Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!naxos!news.belnet.be!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!newsfeed.internetmci.com!151.201.0.37!world6.bellatlantic.net!news kepa@kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi (Aki Pursiainen) wrote: > Hello, o wise old men! > I, a child of the PC generation, am about to aquire my > first minicomputer, a PDP 11/24, and have a couple of questions: You may speak, my son .... ;-) > 1. Is there anything special I should be aware of when moving it? > Does it survive transportation in horizontal position? Just make sure everything is bolted securely, and don't try to lift the system from the flat cables. The only things that may need some attention are the disk drives: remove all packs that are removable. They may have some way (pin? bolt?) to secure the heads while moving. Same thing for tape drives. > 1b. What are the exact physical dimensions of the machine? > it come in different physical configurations? Standard 19" rack width as far as I remember. 8" high? Most installable options (more or less memory, controller cards, etc.) would fit inside the main box, unless you has so many boards that and expansion chassis was required (multiply one of the above unknown measurements by two) The size of a system, as a whole, would change depending on the peripherals it had installed. Most of the volume would be taken by the disk and/or tape drives. > There is a picture of this particular machine at > http://cs.joensuu.fi/~jlind/pdp/ The processor chassis is the yellow unit in the right rack. The cream panel under it is probably just a blank. (or an expansion unit ? The rest is disks and air. > 2. It does not come with a console terminal. I, however, > have a couple ofDigital VT-220s. > What are the correct settings for the terminal? Memory is foggy... I think the baud rate was set by switches in the processor board. In any case, a short trial&error session would be enough > 3. How do I boot the machine? It probably has RSX in it. Power it on. It may : a) go into ODT. (online debugging tool?) Then you must enter the proper command to boot, and it will depend on the disks and controllers you have. b) just boot > 4. Is there a beginners' guide to RSX anywhere online? Most probably not, but you may find people that has the RSX documentation. (or companies, PDP-11 are still in use) Many collectors in the USA keep PDP-11s, I don't know about Finland... What about an older version of Unix ? And for your next 1000 questions, the proper group would be alt.sys.pdp11 RW. ###### From: Tim Bradshaw Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.sys.pdp11 Subject: Re: Beginner's questions about PDP 11/24 Date: 03 Jul 1998 12:48:21 +0100 Organization: AIAI, University of Edinburgh Lines: 22 Sender: tfb@eigg.aiai.ed.ac.uk Message-ID: References: <6nfr39$n7u$1@ligarius.ultra.net> <35a812ec.35291476@news5.bellatlantic.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: eigg.aiai.ed.ac.uk X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.2.25/XEmacs 19.14 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!fu-berlin.de!news-feed.inet.tele.dk!bofh.vszbr.cz!nntp.news.xara.net!xara.net!server6.netnews.ja.net!newsfeed.ed.ac.uk!news * Roberto Waltman wrote: > Most probably not, but you may find people that has the RSX > documentation. (or companies, PDP-11 are still in use) > Many collectors in the USA keep PDP-11s, I don't know > about Finland... > What about an older version of Unix ? Check out PUPS, which is the PDP11 Unix Preservation Society. You can get many old PDP11 Unix versions for personal use, with source, for a small license fee. The web page is http://minnie.cs.adfa.oz.au/PUPS, and there is also a mailing list where people who know a lot of useful stuff about Unix on these machines live. --tim -- Tim Bradshaw, System Manager, Artificial Intelligence Applications Institute, University of Edinburgh ###### From: Pete Turnbull Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.sys.pdp11 Subject: Re: Beginner's questions about PDP 11/24 Date: 3 Jul 1998 15:19:19 GMT Organization: The University of York, UK Lines: 31 Sender: pnt103@york.ac.uk Message-ID: <6nispn$eef$1@pump1.york.ac.uk> References: <6nfr39$n7u$1@ligarius.ultra.net> <35a812ec.35291476@news5.bellatlantic.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: indy005.cs.york.ac.uk User-Agent: tin/pre-1.4-980514 (UNIX) (IRIX/5.3 (IP22)) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!enews.sgi.com!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!news-peer.sprintlink.net!news-peer-east.sprintlink.net!news.sprintlink.net!rill.news.pipex.net!pipex!server1.netnews.ja.net!server5.netnews.ja.net!news.york.ac.uk!not-for-mail In alt.folklore.computers Roberto Waltman wrote: > kepa@kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi (Aki Pursiainen) wrote: >> There is a picture of this particular machine at >> http://cs.joensuu.fi/~jlind/pdp/ > The processor chassis is the yellow unit in the right rack. The > cream panel under it is probably just a blank. (or an expansion > unit ? The rest is disks and air. Not quite; the processor box is the yellow panel with the switch and the blank panel underneath. > Power it on. It may : > a) go into ODT. (online debugging tool?) Then you must enter the > proper command to boot, and it will depend on the disks and > controllers you have. > b) just boot Looks like you have two RL02 drives, in which case the command is probably "DL" at the prompt (if you get a prompt). If it comes up with an "@" prompt, that's ODT, and the command will probalby be "17773000G" (which starts execution at octal address 17773000). I think. It might be a lower address for an 11/24 (as opposed to an 11/23). -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science [remove indy. from email address to reply] University of York ###### From: kepa@kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi (Aki Pursiainen) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.sys.pdp11 Subject: Re: Beginner's questions about PDP 11/24 Date: 4 Jul 1998 22:18:35 GMT Organization: kepanoid - Kepa's komputer Message-ID: References: <6nfr39$n7u$1@ligarius.ultra.net> <35a812ec.35291476@news5.bellatlantic.net> <6nispn$eef$1@pump1.york.ac.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi X-Newsreader: slrn (0.9.3.2 UNIX) Lines: 16 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!ubnnews.unisource.ch!news-nyc.telia.net!howland.erols.net!woodstock.news.demon.net!demon!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!colt.net!Pollux.Teleglobe.net!uunet!in3.uu.net!nntp.inet.fi!newsfeed2.funet.fi!news.funet.fi!news.clinet.fi!news.jmp.fi!kepa Thanks for everybody for the answers so far. I think I have the transportation question figured out by now. I'm going to: -Remove the disk packs. -Lock the heads. I found some information for this operation. -Try to remove at least the disk drives from the rack. Does this sound reasonable? I haven't seen the machine or any other PDP-11 yet. I'll pick the machine up on wednesday next week. I'll probably be back after that asking more questions. Thanks again! -- Kepa (Aki Pursiainen) kepa@kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi http://kepanoid.meri.jmp.fi/