More Terminals
--------------

Christmas came early this year to the Historic Computing
Lab!

Dedicated reader[s?] of this phlog will no doubt remember
that time, back on August 31st, when I expressed doubts that
there were yet more old-time computer terminals to be found
on campus, following several years of me rounding them up
for the Library's historic computing collection [1].

Welp, wrong again. This past week I was alerted the presence
of a couple more terminals over in our Engineering lab
building, along with a variety of other interesting old
computing artifacts. All of which needed to find a new home
now that the server room they had lived in for lo these many
years was being decommissioned and turned to other uses.
(Departmental server rooms also being a Thing of the Past,
these days).

Here's what I wheeled back to the Library on my trusty black
cart with the pneumatic tires:


C. Itoh CIT 467 Terminal (1981)
-------------------------------

Yes, we already had one of these in the collection, also
courtesy of Engineering. So, now we have two. Back in August
I described it as a DEC VT100 clone, which is one of its
personalities I believe, but I have since learned it can
also emulate Tektronix terminals which is cool. It looks
quite a bit like a DEC VT100; apart from the case badge it's
hard to tell the difference. The newly acquired keyboard is,
fortunately, in better shape than our other one.  Although I
have not opened it up to be sure, I think it likely that
this one does not contain a cheese puff snack.


NeXT Cubes (~1990)
------------------

Two NeXT Cubes, complete with monitors, keyboards and mice
(thank goodness, as the Cubes are not much use without their
proprietary peripherals). Plus an additional monitor,
keyboard and mouse still in box.  I've heard tell
Engineering was the distribution point for NeXT hardware on
campus back in the day, which might explain why they still
had a couple on hand. Not sure whether these are operational
or not, but will find out eventually. Here's a thought I
never thought I'd be thinking: given that we already have a
functional NeXT Cube in the collection, and given that I'm
just about out of storage space, do we really need all three
NeXT Cubes, and four monitors?


Amiga 4000T (1995)
------------------

The last Amiga model ever made by Commodore (but no, this
isn't one of the 200 or so they manufactured before the
Amiga line got bought out by Escom). Not entirely sure what
Engineering was using this for.  No monitor unfortunately so
it may be a while before I can test it. Looks to be in good
shape though.


DEC Product Literature
----------------------

A couple of dozen paperback DEC manuals from the early 80s,
mostly technical documentation (eg. Vax Handbook, Terminals
and Communications Handbook, etc, etc). My favourite is
"Guide to Personal Computing," describing various scenarios
where a personal computer might come in handy, illustrated
with photos of very-early-80s-looking people cast in the
roles of consultants, business executives, secretaries,
researchers, etc. Dates from 1982 so it's likely the first
edition.

Oh, and a 40 year old paperback copy of Guy L. Steele's
"Common LISP," first edition, in absolutely pristine
condition. Somebody bought it, once upon a time, but pretty
sure nobody ever read it.

... and that's not all!  I ran out of time after a couple of
trips, so I still need to roll my cart back for one more run
next week.  There's a Televideo terminal I'll be grabbing
for sure (no keyboard though), and possibly some Sun
gear. (They have a whole whack of Ultra 10s, but do I need
Ultra 10s? Decisions ...)


References
----------

[1] All The Terminals Left On Campus
gopher://sdf.org:70/0/users/jdd/phlog/20240831-terminals.txt

Sat Dec 14 14:58:31 PST 2024