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Date:      Mon, 10 Aug 1998 10:46:31 +0930
From:      Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com>
To:        djv@bedford.net
Cc:        freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: FreeBSD
Message-ID:  <19980810104631.O11095@freebie.lemis.com>
In-Reply-To: <199808100006.UAA07079@lucy.bedford.net>; from djv@bedford.net on Sun, Aug 09, 1998 at 08:06:41PM -0400
References:  <19980810083046.K11095@freebie.lemis.com> <199808100006.UAA07079@lucy.bedford.net>

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On Sunday,  9 August 1998 at 20:06:41 -0400, djv@bedford.net wrote:
>> No, Stretch was the 7030, and predated the 360/<anything> by a number
>
> Ah, yes.
>
>> of years.  Supposedly the first machine to achieve 1 MIPS, but it
>> didn't quite make it.
>>
>>> was quite snappy in its time. The apps I ran (numerical) were by
>>> definition CPU bound, anyway. This was a 2 of a kind unit (one for
>>> NSA, one for Los Alamos IIRC), with a hotrod CPU and a big load of
>>> memory, how much I've forgotten (128MB?  More?), which IIRC was made
>>> of discrete transistors.
>
> Small ICs then. Oh well. I don't even know if it was air or water
> cooled. What would you estimate for bits/chip?

No idea.  I've never seen one of them.  If it was MOS, I'd guess 256
bits.  Could be as high as 1024.

>> I've never heard of discrete transistor memory of any size.  The
>> System/360 was the first machine in the world to use integrated
>> circuits in a serious way, but it's possible they made exceptions in
>> strange machines like the 360/195.
>
> When they broke up the /195, I had a chance to get a memory board
> as a souvenir, but I was sick of it by then. Should have got one!
> There were /lots/ of them. The thing filled a very large computer
> installation. (disk farm, rows of tape drives, line printers,
> (I think they even had a page printer of some kind on it), terminal
> equipment, card readers/punches).

Right.  I still have some old 370/158 boards floating around
somewhere.  They're *very* different from other manufacturer's boards.
They were using surface mount even then, and they were all in square
cases with aluminium covers.

>>> I think it was faster than its contemporaries in the 370 series. The
>>> Navy kept it running until ~1986, I believe the power bill was why
>>> they shut it down. :-) (It was at the PAX NATC in S. Maryland).
>>
>> Yes, the 360/195 wasn't really a 360 (all other 360s had model numbers
>> under 100, all 370s over 100).  I've forgotten the details, but for a
>> 360 it really moved.  It probably had over 1 MIPS.
>
> Oh, more than that I think. It was definitely faster than a VAX
> 11/780.  It may have gone through CPU upgrades while at NSA, too.
> (I didn't meet it until around 1980, when it had gone to the Navy.)
> It's also possible that the original specs were deliberately
> understated, too.

I don't think they would have understated the specs of the /195.  It's
known that they did for other processors (ISTR that the 370/145 and
/155 were the same processor bar the clocking, but my memory could be
defective).  But the /195 was to show just how fast they could be.

Greg
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