[SunRescue] OT: AS/400 stuff

[Paul Khoury]

On Mon, 4 Jun 2001 21:42:42 -0500, Chad A. Chance wrote:

>Don't even bother unless you plan on getting a support contract from IBM.
>Pretty much anything on the inside of one of these is proprietary and don't
>even think you`ll be able to find a copy of OS/400. Every copy of the OS I
>have ever seen is a burned copy from IBM with the serial number of the
machine and the cutomer number on it as well.

Burned copy?  As in literally burned?

>I believe that they key the OS media to the machine, At a previous employer
>we had 4 400s, we took one of the older boxes out of service and was going
>to use it as a development box only, we tried to install the  newer OS from
>one of the newer boxes, but it would not work, we eventually had to have IBM
>come out and do it for us with a new set of OS media.
>
>IBM guards their machines and their software very well, once these go out of
>service they turn into scrap metal...
>

Damn.  So it's not really all that useful then?
What I would like is a PC500/P390 machine, or one of the P370 cards.
That is, if I can also find the S/390 software for it (VM/ESA I think?).
I saw some of these, with OS/2 and VM installed selling on ebay, but they
were going for almost $4000!

Now I have a PS/2 Model 95 that is just a giant piece of crap, and my 400 has
been dormant in the corner for months.