[Info-vax] Some good news !

[Bob Koehler]

In article <I8A6RyV+2Mvc at wvnvms>, cook at wvnvms.wvnet.edu (George Cook) writes:
> 
> Even a VAX-11/780 can load VMS from a CI attached CD drive.  Off the
> top of my head, I think the MicroVAX 2000, VAX-11/730 and VAX-11/725
> are the only VAXes unable to load VMS directly (i.e., using no other
> VMS machine or an Infoservers) from a CD drive.  Has anyone tried using
> a CD drive on the MicroVAX 2000 (limited function) SCSI port?

   The primary reason that systems like the 11/730 were desupported
   was that DEC didn't sell and support a disk for them large enough
   to fit VMS on (VMS itself is small, but DEC's disks for those systems
   were tiny).

   Folks with third party disks did find that later than supported
   versions of VMS would load and run on those systems.  After the
   disk drives got too small the maximum supported RAM got to be
   too small, and I can't imagine changing that since most of those
   systems were limitted by bus address space.

   Later systems that could boot over ethernet into a LAVC are even
   easier to keep running.

   None of which has anything to do with the original point, but can
   you imagine being a manager at HP and having to explain that you
   have to keep an MV 2000 and a VAX 9000 running for compatability
   tests?  They don't, and I'm sure the affected manager is glad they
   don't.