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From: hbaker@netcom.com (Henry Baker)
Subject: Re: Retro-Computing!
Message-ID: <hbaker-2703950834120001@192.0.2.1>
Sender: hbaker@netcom17.netcom.com
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References: <D5yxwn.5BG@sdf.saomai.org> <3l2b46$ro0@tools.near.net>
Date: Mon, 27 Mar 1995 16:30:23 GMT
Lines: 24

In article <3l2b46$ro0@tools.near.net>, barmar@nic.near.net (Barry
Margolin) wrote:

> In article <D5yxwn.5BG@sdf.saomai.org> esl@sdf.saomai.org (Eric S.
Lamemond) writes:
> >The Symbolics 3600
> >series were so inferior to machines such as the VAX that they needed what
> >was called a FEP (AMI bios in Pentium UNIX) to boot them!
> 
> The VAX 8000 series needed an 8086 PC front-end to boot them!

In high school I programmed on a 'distributed system' consisting of a
4K IBM 1401 with a direct connection to an IBM 7040.  I got real tired
of having my 1401 assemblies punch out the intermediate deck which was
then reloaded for the 2nd pass, so I wrote a 'memory server' for the
7040 which stored the intermediate pass in the 7040's larger memory.  From
what I've seen of some Unix assemblers, this system may have been faster :-)

I can't claim to have invented the first 'diskless' node, though, since
this 1401 was already 'diskless'.  (It did have 2 tape drives, though.)

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