On Tue, 30 Jun 1998, Rob Deker wrote:

> Well, I picked up a 5000/133 for dirt today (it's got 32 megs of RAM, a PMAG-BB,
> and an RZ24, cost me $25...for anybody here from UMD, it used to be 
> dingdong.cs.umd.edu :) ). Now I have a few questions.

>  - How is the PMAX port with using non-DEC drives? I know it's a
>    stupid question, but I'm just starting w/ this architecture. Can I
>    use a seagate barracuda for instance?

Okay, I guess.  We use an old 380MB full-height Maxtor in an external
box as our "cloning" drive around here.  We also have a 5000/240 running
NetBSD/pmax happily with two Seagate ST43400N and a CDC 94191-15 drive
attached.  Dunno about contemporary drives; our NetBSD/pmax cluster
survives on cast-off DECstations and cast-off hard drives that were
headed for surplus (and rescued by us:).

>  - Is the PMAGB-B supported? The INSTALL for 1.3.2 makes note of the
>    PMAG-DV, PMAG-BA, PMAGB-BA (is this the same as PMAGB-B?), and PMAG-AA.
>  - What should this machine compare to speed-wise for a workstation running
>    X?

The only problem I've ever had with X on NetBSD/pmax is on the 5000/25.
The mouse goes insane whenever there's any kind of load, giving off
spurious mouse clicks and movements.  Kind of makes X unusable on that
hardware.  All the other DECstations---with serial mouse---do not suffer
that malady, though.

Incidentally, has the psycho mouse problem been fixed for 5000/25, now? 
We rotated out all our 5000/25s for 5000/125s and 5000/240s, thereby
"eliminating" the problem that way.  However, since the 5000/25s will
undoubtedly go to surplus now, I might be interested in picking one up
at the surplus auction in the future, but only if X works in a stable
fashion, like on the other hardware.  IIRC, it was still broken as of
the last time we used it on a 5000/25---in 1.3.

Cheers,

Paul.

e-mail: paul@gromit.dlib.vt.edu

"I didn't mean to take up all your sweet time"
	--- James Marshall Hendrix