I have a PDP 11/70, two RA60 drives, Floppy/tape drive and two line printers that I would like to donate. It was used by my fathers LIMS company and has not been booted for over ten years. If interested it is located in my parents basement in Wilmington, Delaware and you will need to arrange for pickup.
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Free PDP 11/70
- Thread starter mlewish
- Start date
EvanK
VCFed Founder
Hello! I run a not-for-profit computer museum in central New Jersey -- anyone here on this forum will vouch for me. We would love to give the /70 a good home in our museum. I will send you a private message. In case you don't receive it, my email is evan@infoage.org. Thank you.
billdeg
Technician
Wow...PM sent earlier, but just thought I'd mention that EvanK and I work together to rescue vintage machines for MARCH... Luck has it that Ian P and Evan will be traveling through WIlmington with a truck for another rescue....if need be I can pick up sooner/love to stop by to check this out. Great news, I hope we can help you out.
Bill
Bill
NF6X
Veteran Member
I'm too far away to adopt this system, but I'd enjoy seeing pictures of it.
fraveydank
Member
This would be a GREAT pick-up for MARCH. I would, in principle, be happy to house it temporarily, but I'm pretty sure my wife would notice me putting an 11/70 in the basement (even if it was "just for a while"). 
Hope you can work this out!
Hope you can work this out!
billdeg
Technician
have not heard back yet.
RSX11M+
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I can promise three things...
At some point, my own collection will be looking for a new home. When that time comes, I hope it will be another enthusiast who will become caretaker.
The owner of this system must have felt as I do, there is value in preserving this history.
- caring, Trouble-free pickup
- A Good home
- It will run again
At some point, my own collection will be looking for a new home. When that time comes, I hope it will be another enthusiast who will become caretaker.
The owner of this system must have felt as I do, there is value in preserving this history.
EvanK
VCFed Founder
In case anyone's wondering what happened with this -- turns out it is an 11/44, not an 11/70. MARCH is picking it up soon. We have a couple of other /44 systems but this one looks to be in better condition.
fraveydank
Member
Big difference! But at least the 11/44 is still a pretty cool machine. And it's a lot easier to get on the truck.
fraveydank
Member
And the line printers, if there's room in the exhibit area, could make for a really cool demonstration!
RSX11M+
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Thanks for the update. It's always difficult to not know what happened with this sort of thing. We can only hope that some day it will be an actual 70.
I'm curious to know - how are the RA60s connected? (if they turn out to be RA60s)
What kind of printers?
EvanK
VCFed Founder
We have some already. They are in storage. However, with last weekend's partial reorganization of our minicomputer exhibit, there might be room for a printer.
gslick
Veteran Member
Wouldn't RA drives normally be connected to a Unibus system with a UDA50 controller? Or were you asking something else?
I have a UDA50. Some day I'd like to find a PDP-11/44 to put it to use.
-Glen
NeXT
Veteran Member
The RA60 does indeed need a UDA50 controller much like my RA82.
RSX11M+
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gslick and NeXT...
You've asked the exact question...
Back in the day, when the RA81 was first introduced, I was trying to expand our 11/70. Up to this point, we had only RL's that were UNIBUS connected, and RM03's that were MASSBUS. [RH70] My boss wouldn't consider RP06 drives.
In looking through the RA81 literature (brand new at that time) I initially made the mistake of thinking that either the HSC50 or UDA50 could be ordered, depending on whether one wanted to attach it via MASSBUS or UNIBUS.
A few phone calls later I came to understand that the HSC50 was VAX and the UDA50 [not quite yet orderable] was for PDP-11. Our field service folks indicated they were expecting an MBA (MASSBUS Adapter) - as they had seen a preliminary one for RA60's that were somewhere under service contract in our region. [North Jersey / NYC metro area]
After a few months - I took the path of least resistance and went UNIBUS - a decision that haunted me for the rest of the time we ran the '70. The UDA50 was a UNIBUS hog - killing many of the advantages the 11/70 could offer when disks were MASSBUS connected. Basically - the whole machine stopped while dealing with the UDA50.
Fast forward to the 2000's - I heard a rumor that some of those RA60s had survived to our epoch... but never found a solid report or saw one in the flesh.
Hence when told this was a 70 with RA60s... well you can guess.
Now that it's a '44 - it still seemed worth asking, but I was expecting the "stock standard answer". Now if the answer came back RH11...
You've asked the exact question...
Back in the day, when the RA81 was first introduced, I was trying to expand our 11/70. Up to this point, we had only RL's that were UNIBUS connected, and RM03's that were MASSBUS. [RH70] My boss wouldn't consider RP06 drives.
In looking through the RA81 literature (brand new at that time) I initially made the mistake of thinking that either the HSC50 or UDA50 could be ordered, depending on whether one wanted to attach it via MASSBUS or UNIBUS.
A few phone calls later I came to understand that the HSC50 was VAX and the UDA50 [not quite yet orderable] was for PDP-11. Our field service folks indicated they were expecting an MBA (MASSBUS Adapter) - as they had seen a preliminary one for RA60's that were somewhere under service contract in our region. [North Jersey / NYC metro area]
After a few months - I took the path of least resistance and went UNIBUS - a decision that haunted me for the rest of the time we ran the '70. The UDA50 was a UNIBUS hog - killing many of the advantages the 11/70 could offer when disks were MASSBUS connected. Basically - the whole machine stopped while dealing with the UDA50.
Fast forward to the 2000's - I heard a rumor that some of those RA60s had survived to our epoch... but never found a solid report or saw one in the flesh.
Hence when told this was a 70 with RA60s... well you can guess.
Now that it's a '44 - it still seemed worth asking, but I was expecting the "stock standard answer". Now if the answer came back RH11...
NeXT
Veteran Member
I can only recall making the link between the RA60 and UDA50 a year ago when someone was giving away some RA60's and I wanted to see if it was possible to swap out my lemon RA82 with the RA60 and not switch controllers. I think it was the RA60's service manual that even said it however my /84 is naturally QBUS and Unibus so I can't say anything myself about MASSBUS.
RSX11M+
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The last 84 I had anything to do with, had an RM03 attached to it (via RH11(?)) and was used solely to read old media. That same machine had the RA81/UDA50 combo transplanted to it, also from the 70. (not the RH11 obviously) The 84 was cheaper to run than the 70, albeit significantly slower.
This didn't matter to anyone by then as most development in the department was moving to PC, and the DEC OEM product offering to WANG VS. (a laughably bad move as it would turn out) That was 1991 I think.
Frankly, the engineering department became bored with assembly language programming and seduced management into making more "Sexy" choices. By then, the group that remained weren't able to think their way out of a paper bag - so the situation was hopeless anyway. That engineering dept was bull-dozed by a hatchet-man in around 1993 and I had to go back and rescue some of the irreplaceable materials - almost literally from the dumpster. A surreal experience for me, I can tell you.
Bankruptcy ended the disaster in the late 90s early 2000s.
A very common tale for the time.
Please don't give up on that RA82.
This didn't matter to anyone by then as most development in the department was moving to PC, and the DEC OEM product offering to WANG VS. (a laughably bad move as it would turn out) That was 1991 I think.
Frankly, the engineering department became bored with assembly language programming and seduced management into making more "Sexy" choices. By then, the group that remained weren't able to think their way out of a paper bag - so the situation was hopeless anyway. That engineering dept was bull-dozed by a hatchet-man in around 1993 and I had to go back and rescue some of the irreplaceable materials - almost literally from the dumpster. A surreal experience for me, I can tell you.
Bankruptcy ended the disaster in the late 90s early 2000s.
A very common tale for the time.
Please don't give up on that RA82.
gslick
Veteran Member
I am also in the dead RA82 owners club. It would be nice to see it spun up and working sometime. I can't even get any diagnostic output from it's serial port. I should take another look at that drive sometime.
I find my RA92 much easier to move around compared to an RA81 or RA90. Is an RA82 the same basic size/weight as an RA80?