rtVAX 300, was Re: lunchbox VAXen, was Re: [HECnet] Introducing myself... and my little network

[Gregg Levine]

On Thu, Jun 7, 2012 at 9:01 PM, Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> wrote:
On 06/07/2012 08:29 PM, Gregg Levine wrote:
I don't know why, but here goes, a while ago there were advertisements
for a thing DEC called the "rtVAX", it was the processor element in a
case about the size of a paperback and mounted on a VME board.

  Like this one?

  http://www.neurotica.com/misc/rtVAX-300-1.jpg
  http://www.neurotica.com/misc/rtVAX-300-2.jpg

  I picked that up at a hamfest just this past weekend! =)

  The rtVAX-300 is significantly smaller than a paperback, by the way.
If memory serves, it contains a CVAX chipset, an Ethernet controller
(SGEC I think), and some ROM.

They advertised it as an embedded processor for specialty
applications. The user would, what else? build their code on a host
such as what we are talking about and including the implied
difficulties of debugging it of course, and then deploy it onto the
unit's storage media. And then off it went wearing the code written
and the rest of it on something else.

Why I want one (or two or three or four) is any number of reasons, but
it would be an interesting job getting one of the things working on
our network.

  I think it wouldn't be too tough to get most any OS running on it that
supports a CVAX-based machine.   I'm looking forward to messing with it.
  It's on a 6U VME module made by Aeon, and with it I also got a 6U VME
mass storage module (a SCSI hard drive, and a floppy drive with a SCSI
bridge board) and a very nice card cage with attached power supply.
There's also a Motorola MVME-series 68040 CPU board in the card cage.

                    -Dave

--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA

Hello!
Oh my field density equalizers!
That gizmo is the one.

And if I had the space I'd track the thing down, again. I already have
an M68K based VME board here. My problem isn't now finding a card cage
for it, its working on how to get our old friend Tux working there.

Well someday perhaps. If you do find the time to get it working with
your favorite OS, can you do me a favor and work on how to get me
access onto it?
-----
Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com
"This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."