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From: cubexyz@gmail.com (Mark Longridge)
Subject: [TUHS] PDP-11 questions
Date: Sun, 24 Jan 2016 12:37:25 -0500	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <CADxT5N5YPmJRM9PC-KGHb6ua7eB4JtKHAfURxm5JsynDgUv8iQ@mail.gmail.com> (raw)

Ok, I got a few questions about PDP-11.

First, I was wondering when Bell Labs got that first PDP-11/20 what
software (if any) came with it? I assume when one bought a PDP-11/20
you would get some type of OS with it.

According to the folks at alt.sys.pdp11 the PDP-11 computer doesn't
have anything equivalent to a PC's BIOS. But I know a bit about what a
PC's BIOS does and that includes RAM Initialization. Wouldn't the DRAM
on the PDP-11/something need to be initialized too? Perhaps an older
PDP-11 doesn't have DRAM but surely the later models did?

Now the last question has to do with what made the PDP-11 architecture
so great. Part of that had to be the relatively affordablility of the
PDP-11 and of course it was the machine that made Unix possible. It
seems though that there should have been a PDP-11 based desktop and as
far as I can tell that didn't happen. Instead we got a bunch of micros
with 8080, z80 and 6502 cpus, but nothing that could run Unix, at
least not a Unix v7 with source code.

Mark


             reply	other threads:[~2016-01-24 17:37 UTC|newest]

Thread overview: 42+ messages / expand[flat|nested]  mbox.gz  Atom feed  top
2016-01-24 17:37 Mark Longridge [this message]
2016-01-24 18:06 ` [TUHS] [Bulk] " Mark Green
2016-01-24 18:49 ` [TUHS] " Clem Cole
2016-01-25  3:16   ` Dave Horsfall
2016-01-25  5:32     ` Warren Toomey
2016-01-25 12:27       ` Clem cole
2016-01-25 13:38         ` Lawrence Stewart
2016-01-25 14:15           ` Clem Cole
2016-01-26 19:52         ` Dave Horsfall
2016-01-26 20:41           ` Clem Cole
2016-01-24 18:01 Noel Chiappa
2016-01-24 18:30 Noel Chiappa
2016-01-24 18:36 ` Ronald Natalie
2016-01-24 21:10   ` John Cowan
2016-01-25  0:11 ` scj
2016-01-25  0:36   ` Clem cole
     [not found] <mailman.25.1453658502.15972.tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org>
2016-01-24 18:34 ` Johnny Billquist
2016-01-24 18:56 Noel Chiappa
2016-01-24 22:40 Norman Wilson
2016-01-25  0:23 ` Ronald Natalie
2016-01-24 22:40 Norman Wilson
2016-01-25  1:55 ` David Ritchie
2016-01-25  1:59   ` Ronald Natalie
2016-01-25  2:14   ` Clem cole
2016-01-25 11:29 ` Tony Finch
2016-01-25 13:25   ` Ronald Natalie
2016-01-25 16:18   ` Pete Turnbull
2016-01-25 19:37     ` Clem Cole
2016-01-25  1:11 Noel Chiappa
2016-01-25  1:30 ` Clem cole
     [not found] <mailman.29.1453684304.15972.tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org>
2016-01-25  3:07 ` Johnny Billquist
2016-01-25  3:09 ` Johnny Billquist
2016-01-25 12:54   ` John Cowan
2016-01-25 13:09     ` Johnny Billquist
2016-01-25 13:49     ` Johnny Billquist
2016-01-25 16:00       ` John Cowan
2016-01-25 16:17         ` Johnny Billquist
2016-01-25 16:43           ` John Cowan
2016-01-26 19:36 Doug McIlroy
2016-01-26 19:59 ` Warren Toomey
2016-01-26 20:07 Doug McIlroy
2016-01-26 20:44 ` Clem Cole

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