Home computing
What good is a network without computers? What good is a computer
without a network? The peecee revolution has left lots of interesting
hardware out there.
I already have a 2GHz Athlon machine that does the job in a most
unexciting fashion.
Classic Computing
It's a fact that I've been doing computing for a long time. Lately I've decided that
collecting some nice machines wouldn't be a bad idea. But I will start with a list
of machines that I've used --- meaning written code of one variety or another.
#table
l l l.
Machine Where Comments
B5500 SRI Bob Barton's stack machine, written only in ALGOL-60
*SDS-940 Tymshare One of my favorite machines; 24 bit instructions, 12 bit VA
B6700 UCSD A newer version of the B5500; I actually used card punches...
*PDP-6,10 SAIL,IRCAM 36 bit machines, halfword instructions and fun OS
Alto PARC,Rochester My all time favorite machine; almost a Nova
*PDP-11 SAIL,IRCAM A great instruction set, possibily the best ever
VAX Rochester,Bell Labs The classic CISC
5620 Bell Labs Bart Locanthi's thin terminal
Sun Bell Labs,Rutgers RISCy business
SGI Bell Labs Running 10th Ed. and Plan9
#end
Thus far, I've collected a VAX 3100/M38, an SGI Indigo2, an SGI Octane and a Sun Ultra 1. What I
wouldn't do to get an Alto again.
Home networking
I live in an enormous house, which was acquired mainly because it is
beautiful and it was available...
The house is so big and the walls so thick, that wireless just doesn't
cover the house. This is not a theoretical statement but rather a measurement
using a wireless laptop.
I established the following design criteria:
- The wireless base must be able to reach the kitchen table and the
porch table (wireless computing in the summer evening is a must)
- All floors should have at least one outlet
- Switches, not hubs should be used for full bandwidth
- Fibre channel looks like too much fun to ignore
The resulting network diagram is shown in the image below:
![[network diagram]](network.gif)
Note the use of IEEE 488; this is because almost everything in the electronics
lab uses 488. The Iotech 488/D is D for Digital and was OEM'ed to DEC for
use in the VAX. Believe it or leave it, Iotech doesn't have a single manual
for it. Attempts to find the source code of the VMS driver failed. So
I'm on my own, or I'll have to use a PC card. There is a comparable box
for the Sun (488/S).
The following Ethernet equipment was obtained from the
usual source:
- 3Com 16492A switches (new and in the box)
- Swing gate wall mounted rack
- 12 outlet 19" 1U
And, for the Fibre Channel (FC) network...
- Fibre channel (FC) ↔ SCSI converter
- FC hub
- FC disk array (Sun T3)
- FC PCI card
The network itself was wired by an electrician who hates wires on the outside
of houses, so he pulled it all the way from the basement to the attic.
The cable is Belden Datatwist, obtained from the usual source. The wall
outlets are from Leviton. The wires all meet in the basement, as shown
in the picture below:
Home electronics
I had always wanted an electronics lab. So finally I have one.
I have assembled various notes on test equipment.
File last written on Wed Jan 10 12:15:49 EST 2018
e-mail: mark.kahrs at gmail daht com
home page:http://www.kahrs.us/~mark