So, as I posted in my previous post, the MD80 simulator was to run on a MicroVAX. The exchange that led me to believe this was the exchange with one of the other people at the sim. It went something like this… “The new sim has a bit newer systems. It’s something… something VAX?”
Me: “MicroVAX?” Him: “MicroVAX, that’s it!” - I guess I led him on. I was enthusiastic about this, because this meant I had a bunch of spares, and the hardware tends to be easier to restore and maintain. Well, I recently got a look at the crates. The system is a decidedly non-micro VAX-11/785!
My feelings about this revelation are mixed. On one hand: holy tapdancing crap, a VAX-11/785! I’m going to get to fire up a 785! It’s got a line printer and everything! Much much love! - on the more pragmatic side, though, it’s a huge, potentially unreliable machine. It’s going to be at least as much trouble as the 11/45 to bring up. But by then I’ll have some more experience. At least this isn’t some oddball shared-memory configuration… And it’s running VAX/VMS, so I actually have a semblance of knowledge of the OS.
The VAX-11/785 is a clocked-up version of the original VAX, the VAX-11/780, pictured on the left. The 785 is approx. 1.5x times faster than the 780. The machine includes an LSI-11/03 as the console processor. If I’m not mistaken, this sits at the bottom of the rack, together with an RX01 or RX02.
In Trondheim at NTNU, there exists a Unibus extension rack(The one in the middle in the picture, between the CPU and the tape drives) for the 11/780, with no obvious clue why (there is no machine that size there).
