[Info-vax] VMS on Raspberry Pi 5

[Martin Gregorie]

On Mon, 13 Nov 2023 23:42:16 +0000, Chris Townley wrote:

> On 13/11/2023 22:00, Martin Gregorie wrote:
>> On Mon, 13 Nov 2023 17:36:53 +0000, Chris Townley wrote:
>> 
>>> On 13/11/2023 17:32, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
>>>> On 2023-11-13, Arne Vajhøj <arne at vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On 11/13/2023 5:26 AM, Pancho wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> I don't really know the performance penalty of emulators.
>>>>>
>>>>> The overhead of a non-JIT instruction set emulation must be huge.
>>>>
>>>> Back in my Amiga days, I played with the Transformer, a software
>>>> emulation of an 8088 on a 68000.  It would run MS-DOS, but very
>>>> slowly - I figured about a 10x slowdown.
>>>> Once just for giggles I ran Z80MU (a Z80 emulation for MS-DOS) under
>>>> the Transformer.  Under these two levels of emulation I fired up the
>>>> CP/M BASIC interpreter and typed "PRINT SIN(whatever)".  It came back
>>>> with the correct answer - 7 seconds later.
>>>>
>>>>
>>> That sounds like the Sinclair scientific calculator in the early 70s
>> 
>> I had one of the really small 4 function calculators in 1975. IIRC it
>> wasn't all that slow (similar speed to a slide rule if each calculation
>> required both slide and cursor to be moved for each calculation) but
>> its main drawbacks was being really too small and fiddly, I used to be
>> pretty good with the mechanical, electrically driven FACIT desktop
>> calculators and I'd say the Sinclairs were just a little faster than
>> those Facits.
>> 
>> However, I got an HP 21 (RPN0 calculator in 1977 and that was much
>> faster AND much stronger and better made: still have it and it still
>> works, but got an HP 21 (programmable too). That got replaced by an HP
>> 28s in 1990 and is still in daily use.
>>
> No this was the earlier scientific calculator, and a few years earlier.
> When you pressed a function, the screen would go blank for about 7
> seconds. |But at the time, and the price it was phenomenal!

The HP21 came out in 1975 was functionally identical to the earlier HP35, 
but was a bit smaller and using a different case design and runs off two 
AA NiCd cells.

The HP28S came out in 1988 and is quite flat (160 x 90 x 19 mm) and runs 
for around a year on a set of three N-batteries.

-- 

Martin    | martin at
Gregorie  | gregorie dot org