3 ms·

What's more, when it comes to computer architectures, even among Digital it's not the oldest nor still supported. Because you can still buy a new PDP-10 (well,

by p_l 5y ago

What's more, when it comes to computer architectures, even among Digital it's not the oldest nor still supported. Because you can still buy a new PDP-10 (well, PDP-10 compatible, iirc a lot of I/O is different, but it can run TOPS-20 V7 with patches) Of course S/360 has longer continuity of hw/sw combination.

kragen 5y ago
You can't buy it from Digital, and TOPS-20 isn't still supported.
skissane 5y ago
> Because you can still buy a new PDP-10 (well, PDP-10 compatible, iirc a lot of I/O is different, but it can run TOPS-20 V7 with patches) Who is still selling new PDP-10-compatibles? Systems Concepts? XKL?
- p_l 5y ago
  XKL is still around and makes PDP-10-on-a-chip for internal use, some people managed to get just the PDP-10 part sold.
  - skissane 5y ago
    XKL is still around indeed, but do they still manufacture the TOAD-2 CPUs? Do they still use it in their current products? The TOAD-2 dates from around 2005 or so, it was designed to be used as a service/management processor in XKL's optical routers, although it could run a patched version of TOPS-20. But do XKL's current products still use it? I can't find any information on whether or not they do, but I'd be surprised if they were still using a 15+ year old part in their latest products.
    - p_l 5y ago
      There apparently was no need to update the design, and so TOAD-2 is still in use. At the very least, last year or so I've seen 2 new TOAD-2 boards ending up outside XKL, with caveat that they do not want to make a business out of selling just the TOAD-2 boards (they do not want to deal with providing support etc.) So various signs on heaven and earth point to still made equipment using TOAD-2s.
      - skissane 5y ago
        > At the very least, last year or so I've seen 2 new TOAD-2 boards ending up outside XKL I don't think that proves they still include TOAD-2 in new systems. It is equally compatible with all TOAD-2-based systems going EOL: likely they had some new boards set aside as spare parts for the production systems, once all customers stop using the old TOAD-2-based systems in production, the spare parts are no longer required, and so XKL may have decided to quietly give away (or sell) those spare parts to well-connected 36-bit enthusiasts. Furthermore, there is a good reason to believe they don't use TOAD-2 any more: if you look at the manuals at XKL.com, you'll find recent products are running an operating system called "DXMOS". It appears to be a custom operating system based on *BSD but with a UI inspired by Cisco IOS (so similar in architectural concept to Juniper JunOS, but aiming to be closer in CLI syntax to IOS than JunOS is). The various copyright acknowledgements in their manual (all three of FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD) support that conclusion (most likely they have picked one of the three as a base, but borrowed some code from the other two as well). It seems rather unlikely a *BSD is running on a 36-bit CPU such as TOAD-2, it seems much more likely it is running on some industry standard 32/64-bit CPU such as x86 (or maybe ARM or POWER or MIPS). Furthermore, the copyright acknowledgements and release notes also show dependence on a number of other software libraries (SSLeay, OpenSSL, OpenSSH, Dropbear SSH – not all at the same time, of course, in recent versions they switched from OpenSSH to Dropbear) which seem rather unlikely to have been ported to run on a 36-bit platform.

by p_l 5y ago

kragen 5y ago

You can't buy it from Digital, and TOPS-20 isn't still supported.

skissane 5y ago

> Because you can still buy a new PDP-10 (well, PDP-10 compatible, iirc a lot of I/O is different, but it can run TOPS-20 V7 with patches) Who is still selling new PDP-10-compatibles? Systems Concepts? XKL?

p_l 5y ago
XKL is still around and makes PDP-10-on-a-chip for internal use, some people managed to get just the PDP-10 part sold.
- skissane 5y ago
  XKL is still around indeed, but do they still manufacture the TOAD-2 CPUs? Do they still use it in their current products? The TOAD-2 dates from around 2005 or so, it was designed to be used as a service/management processor in XKL's optical routers, although it could run a patched version of TOPS-20. But do XKL's current products still use it? I can't find any information on whether or not they do, but I'd be surprised if they were still using a 15+ year old part in their latest products.
  - p_l 5y ago
    There apparently was no need to update the design, and so TOAD-2 is still in use. At the very least, last year or so I've seen 2 new TOAD-2 boards ending up outside XKL, with caveat that they do not want to make a business out of selling just the TOAD-2 boards (they do not want to deal with providing support etc.) So various signs on heaven and earth point to still made equipment using TOAD-2s.
    - skissane 5y ago
      > At the very least, last year or so I've seen 2 new TOAD-2 boards ending up outside XKL I don't think that proves they still include TOAD-2 in new systems. It is equally compatible with all TOAD-2-based systems going EOL: likely they had some new boards set aside as spare parts for the production systems, once all customers stop using the old TOAD-2-based systems in production, the spare parts are no longer required, and so XKL may have decided to quietly give away (or sell) those spare parts to well-connected 36-bit enthusiasts. Furthermore, there is a good reason to believe they don't use TOAD-2 any more: if you look at the manuals at XKL.com, you'll find recent products are running an operating system called "DXMOS". It appears to be a custom operating system based on *BSD but with a UI inspired by Cisco IOS (so similar in architectural concept to Juniper JunOS, but aiming to be closer in CLI syntax to IOS than JunOS is). The various copyright acknowledgements in their manual (all three of FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD) support that conclusion (most likely they have picked one of the three as a base, but borrowed some code from the other two as well). It seems rather unlikely a *BSD is running on a 36-bit CPU such as TOAD-2, it seems much more likely it is running on some industry standard 32/64-bit CPU such as x86 (or maybe ARM or POWER or MIPS). Furthermore, the copyright acknowledgements and release notes also show dependence on a number of other software libraries (SSLeay, OpenSSL, OpenSSH, Dropbear SSH – not all at the same time, of course, in recent versions they switched from OpenSSH to Dropbear) which seem rather unlikely to have been ported to run on a 36-bit platform.