[rescue] WTB: Good 'antique' computer for education

[rescue at sunhelp.org]

bigendian at mac.com writes:

>My fiance is looking for an OLD computer to teach herself some 
>computer architecture.  I'm thinking something with a card cage.  My 
>personal favorite are the VME based sun machines but I'm open to 
>ideas.  I need something where she can get replacement parts cheaply 
>and (relatively) easily.  Would a VAX be good for this?  What about 
>an -11?  How small can I make an -11 or a VAX?  Does anybody have 
>anything they would be willing to let go or a place to get this kind 
>of stuff?  (I wouldn't mind getting a VME sun... Especially not an 
>4/xxx deskside one)

If you're talking about understanding instruction by instruction how
the machine accomplishes things, down at the machine code level, then
an old mini with a full front panel is *incredibly* usefull. You learn
that stuff really quickly when you can *see* the bits flipping in front
of you. :-)

Unfortunately, your chances of finding a machine with a real front panel
that runs without a lot of fixin is a bit low at this point.

-------- David Fischer --------- dave at cca.org --------- www.cca.org --------
-------- If it wasn't for good luck, I wouldn't have no luck at all. -------