to me a 'server' is simply a network file server that connects to newer boxes via token ring or Ethernet interfaces. I have always generically referred to any server that sends data to dozens or more dumb terminals or teletypes as 'mainframes' whether or not that is the correct term. I do not remember the name-the company is now defunct. the mainframe was a proprietary make and had some medical branding on it. downstairs, where you actually interacted with it, were dumb terminals with keyboards made by WYSE. it was kept upstairs, and the terminals were all connected to it by wire. It was considerably smaller than that-it was along the same footprint of an AST Mentor-if you remember those, it was basically the same size as a small entertainment cabinet, produced so much heat it had a R-12 Freon based cooling unit inside. Tape drives were also the way that old mainframes and minis were booted. Tapes were more cost-effective than spinning media drives, and more efficient for reading sequential access data. Another one that was clearly written for revenge cycled the reciprocating assembly back and forth repeatedly, causing the whole assembly to move across the floor!īack then tape drives were still used to store data. One program moved the read/write heads in a way that played a little tune. ![]() I've heard stories about mainframe programmers writing assembler programs that made these large spinning disk or drum drives do things beside storage. And while a hard disk drive that fills up a 19" relay rack is gigantic by today's standards, the "big iron" mainframe DASD boxes were as big as a clothes washer, and sometimes even larger: That's the only machine larger than a desktop microcomputer that Xenix was compiled for. ![]() Click to expand.I think what you're calling a "mainframe" was actually a DEC PDP-11 minicomputer.
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