The chip comes from an Amdahl mainframe and Gene Amdahl didn't give them out like party favors.
When last seen, this was in the pile of abandoned treasures from when I left Cincinnati. In the context of computer history, this thing is a dinosaur bone. Don't chuck it if you find it. No telling if it's worth anything but that's not the point. There will be very damn few of these around.
The Amdahl 470/6 came out in 1975 and was a direct competitor with IBM in the large-scale mainframe business. I'm really not sure now but I think the V6 in Cincinnati may have only had four megabytes of main storage.
Amdahl was ultra-cool compared to IBM and this was the lunatic fringe buying into them. The quality of the machines was impeccable, the systems support from Amdahl systems programmers was the best anywhere, and the machines were faster ... and cheaper.
Bob Caster from S.W.O.R.C.C. and my ol' Dad, Alex Fraser, for the academics of the University fought to have Amdahl hardware and that victory lasted, along with some outstanding parties, for years and years.
S.W.O.R.C.C. is SouthWestern Ohio Regional Computing Center (geek capital of the Midwest)
The point of coolness is IBM machines because they were water-cooled whereas Amdahl machines were air-cooled. It takes a substantial amount of really crazy plumbing to get water in and out of an IBM mainframe but that problem was bypassed altogether by Gene Amdahl.
Amdahl left the company in 1980, when it had become a major business, to start new endeavors. Fujitsu consequently ran it into the ground and it went out of business in 1997. (WIKI: Amdahl Corporation)
When last seen, this was in the pile of abandoned treasures from when I left Cincinnati. In the context of computer history, this thing is a dinosaur bone. Don't chuck it if you find it. No telling if it's worth anything but that's not the point. There will be very damn few of these around.
The Amdahl 470/6 came out in 1975 and was a direct competitor with IBM in the large-scale mainframe business. I'm really not sure now but I think the V6 in Cincinnati may have only had four megabytes of main storage.
Amdahl was ultra-cool compared to IBM and this was the lunatic fringe buying into them. The quality of the machines was impeccable, the systems support from Amdahl systems programmers was the best anywhere, and the machines were faster ... and cheaper.
Bob Caster from S.W.O.R.C.C. and my ol' Dad, Alex Fraser, for the academics of the University fought to have Amdahl hardware and that victory lasted, along with some outstanding parties, for years and years.
S.W.O.R.C.C. is SouthWestern Ohio Regional Computing Center (geek capital of the Midwest)
The point of coolness is IBM machines because they were water-cooled whereas Amdahl machines were air-cooled. It takes a substantial amount of really crazy plumbing to get water in and out of an IBM mainframe but that problem was bypassed altogether by Gene Amdahl.
Amdahl left the company in 1980, when it had become a major business, to start new endeavors. Fujitsu consequently ran it into the ground and it went out of business in 1997. (WIKI: Amdahl Corporation)
No comments:
Post a Comment