Our dear friend Gerard helped us out for two weeks, traveling all the way from the Netherlands to join us. He was able to read several magnetic tapes on our M4 tape drive. Most importantly, he managed to assemble a fully functional unit from our two 405 punch card readers. By combining the two devices, he also made it possible for the 405 to now run at 50 Hz. A big thank you from the whole team for your hard work.
We’ve reached another milestone—our SUN E10000 (e10k) is up and running again. Not all CPUs are installed yet, as we had a few faulty modules in the system, but we have enough replacement parts on hand.
We’d like to thank Alex, our sysop for the e10k, He worked tirelessly on the system, even going so far as to replace the entire module carrier along with the backplane.
By comparison, our e10k is breathtakingly fast for the year 1997; at full capacity, it achieves approximately 51 gigaflops at 64-bit—which is also what a modern smartphone can do today at 64-bit. Of course, desktop CPUs today are many times faster, operating in the teraflop range, and an Nvidia RTX delivers around 50 teraflops.
We’re looking forward to exciting applications for the e10k, which has found a new home right next to our CRAY Y-MP/EL.
It’s VCFe time again in Munich, and cray-cyber.org and datArena are there! Tours of our project at the Bundeswehr University Munich are available on Saturday and Sunday.
Credit: H. Pedersen/ESO (the full license is at https://www.eso.org/public/copyright)
The Halley Comet is back!
We were able to read a few files from DDS-1..2 cassettes for ESO. Fabio Sogni was looking for a way to retrieve the data from the cassettes. After several attempts failed, he turned to Cray-Cyber and datArena. We had been using a working DDS-3 drive for the Cray YMP-EL in our archive since 2018. Using tools developed by Gerard J van der Grinten, we were able to create TAP files. This allowed us to rescue nearly 2,000 files. One of them is shown in the photo above.
Otherwise:
Unfortunately, we are repeatedly held back by deficiencies in air conditioning technology and buildings.
John and I were able to make progress on the 960, and the Cray YMP-EL is being excellently maintained by our new colleagues and is running wonderfully. The E10K is also making progress and will be back in operation in Q1 2026. Our colleagues were also able to get a PDP-11/40 up and running, along with many other machines.
Unfortunately, we are currently unable to offer online access, but we hope that this will be possible again soon.
I wish you all the best, happy holidays, and a happy start to the new year.
Ralf N.
We are currently working on all systems.
The Cyber 930 console has been converted to XT-IDE with 128MB disk on module, the 960 is completely assembled and is currently being repaired.
The 930 has a problem with its batteries and the 5V power supply from CEAG is defective and is being overhauled.
E10k and Cyber 4000 are also moving into the operating range.
Now we get ready for install our first “production” System and 400Hz power supply.
We have moved the first computers to our new showroom and storage room.
Many thanks to the UniBw for the active support and endurance.
The colleagues in Vandenberg (USA) have shut down their 960 forever in June 2021.
I really hope we get our 960 back in service. At the moment it doesn’t look bad, our small data center doesn’t have a suitable power connection. However, the new building is almost finished, only small things are missing.
Last year we mainly took care of the CDC 960. It’s time to continue with the small Cray.
The Cray is running, I am very happy that there was no bigger problem. Now we can take care of the UNICOS and the network.
