31 Jan
2017
31 Jan
'17
10:33 p.m.
From: Nigel Williams
Is it a reasonable claim that the PDP-10 made
time-sharing "common"
... I'm presuming that "common" should be read as ubiquitous and
accessible
I'm wondering if it was really the combination of the PDP-11
Good question; I think a case can be made both ways.
(lower-cost more models)
One observation I will make: the two don't have identical time-lines; the
earliest PDP-10 models predate the PDP-11 by a good chunk, and the PDP-11
out-lasted the PDP-10. So that has a big influence, I think, on the question
above.
The first PDP-10 (the KA - we'll leave aside the even earlier PDP-6) was made
out of small cards with individual transistors (B-series Flip Chips), whereas
the earliest PDP-11 model (the -11/20) used SSI TTL on much larger cards.
Ditto on the other end: the last PDP-10 sold used 29xx bit-slice technology,
whereas the PDP-11 lasted through three generations of microprocessor (the
LSI-11, Fonz, and Jaws).
Noel