First Computers (was Re: [SunRescue] Yay, I don't feel...)

[Clay Mellender]

Ahhh Cromemco. Those were the days. If anybody ever comes across a Z2 or
system 3 series going into the dumpster let me know (Or any cromemco for
that matter). My first Unix experience was with my dad's System3 running
Cromix. I still have 3 of the 5 wyse 50's that were hooked to it. The
neatest thing for the Cromremco boxes was the "Maximizer", which I
believe had a 68*** something or other that ran at 40Mhz and took 2
S-100 slots. I still have the maximizer somewhere.
Clay

BSD Bob the old greybeard BSD freak wrote:
> 
> > While we're on this trend- what was everyone's first computer? Do you
> > still own it?? Still use it?
> 
> Used or owned?  I first used one in '72 when I took my first computer
> class, Fortran IV, but we used punch cards back then.  When I cleaned
> out my office a few months back I found a stack of about a hundred cards
> with one of my programs ready to go... anyone still got a live card
> reader?  I used a DEC pdp-somethingorother with an ASR33 for RJE input
> and output for my thesis work in 1977 or so.  I don't remember offhand
> if the machine ran UNIX, or just what it ran.  The first real computer
> I ``owned'' was a ``laboratory data logger'' machine (we were not allowed
> to usurp the computing center's powers and actually own a computer back
> then...1979), which was a hand built Cromemco S-100 thingie with adc
> boards logging to paper tape which was later uploaded to the mainframe
> for Fortran gobbling.  Output was also back through the ASR33 onto
> yellow canary rollform.  When cleaning out said office, I found a
> file with some leftover Fortran canary form.  When not datalogging,
> the ASR33 was hooked up to the ``Internet'' via a high-level line
> driver through lines snaked through the steam tunnels over to the
> computer center, starting in November, '80.  I still have the line
> driver box, with the date scribbled on it, for some fun laughs.
> Later I added real 81K floppers onto the thing, and ran CDOS and CP/M.
> When I trashed the equipment, a couple of years back, I noted we had
> run CDOS 0.11, 0.20, 1.07, 2.17, 2.36, 2.52, 2.58, and CP/M 2.2.
> I wound up building several of these S100 critters as dataloggers
> and office machines.  For printers, I had, of all things, Teletype
> Model 40 chain printers.  You could hear them all the way down the
> hall, at speed.... brraaaappp, brraaaappp, brraaaappp, as the line
> of hammers fired in sequence.  They were the fastest printers around
> the department, until laserjets.  A couple of months back, I gave
> all my leftover S100 bits and a mountain of floppers to a local.
> If anyone needs any of the old Cromemco disks, holler, before they
> eventually lose the bytebits, and he chucks 'em.
> 
> I touched my first UNIX box (old Trash 80 16B with Xenix 1.01) in
> 1983.  In 1987, we got an RT with AIX 2, on loan from IBM, while
> our Model 80 with AIX 1.1 was being put together.  We had to wait
> 8 months for the AIX 1.1, and it was still hot off the press when
> we got it.  That AIX 1.1 thing is still sitting on the shelf, with
> a MooU tag on it, and will be the last thing I surplus when I retire.
> The AIX 1.1 Model 80 crate I set up as our departmental Email server,
> ftp archives, and internet gateway, via a 300 line Pentel 9600 baud
> async hub.  Running 300 accounts on a 16mhz 386 box, was an interesting
> trial by fire.  A couple years later we updated to real ethernet.  The
> departement went Winblows crazy in 1995, and me and one other fellow
> are the only UNIX holdouts.  My current office sports one Winblows
> box (to be compatible with the herd), and 3 UNIX servers, for good
> measure.  At home, the wife gets one Winblows box, and the old man,
> maybe a couple dozen UNIX toys of this and that flavor.
> 
> Bob
> 
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