[Info-vax] DEC Large Systems

[Michael Moroney]

Bill Gunshannon <bill.gunshannon at gmail.com> writes:


>Another question born out of curiosity.

>I was looking at a catalog called Large Systems Software
>Referral Catalog (Fourth Edition) from 1984.

>It lists DECsystem-10, DECSYSTEM-20 and VAX. (notice the
>curious spellings used by DEC themselves  :-)

>What exactly did the VAX offer or what shortcomings were
>seen in the 10 and 20 that caused VAX to become the hero
>and the other large systems to go away?

Marketing.

The business model of DEC at the time was that various groups were independent,
and often competed with each other.  I am not at all familiar with the DEC-10
and DEC-20 systems, however at the time of the VAX these were the "big" systems
available from DEC. They competed for the high end of the then-newish VAX market.

It came down from on high that VAX/VMS was the future of the company and the
10/20 line and TOPS (its OS) would go EOL. Sound familiar?  The "Jupiter" product, 
the next DEC-20 under development, a big system, and nearly ready I believe, was 
killed.  Complaints from both within DEC and DEC-20 customers were truly legendary. 
It was a preview of the Alphacide.  Many DEC-20 customers, instead of switching to
VAX/VMS like they were "supposed to", went to IBM or elsewhere and never looked
back.

Who knows what would have happened if Jupiter wasn't killed.  However, unlike
Alphacide in favor of the Itanic, we do know the VAX/VMS was successful.