Yup the 11/60 had WCS, although few customers used it. CMU/3 Rivers had created the 40e
with a WCS, and wrote a call/return instruction for C. We had a hacked UNIX to use it.
When I was at Tek, Steve Glaser and I toyed with trying to write the uCode for the 60 to
do the same thing to try to buy some more performance (it was the first UNIX box at Tek
and quickly got overloaded), but we never did - as we replaced it with an 11/70.
The 60 also was known for the confuse uCode instructions and since the front panel was run
by the uCode the only solution was the pull the power to halt it.
Clem
On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 12:44 PM, <Paul_Koning at dell.com> wrote:
On Feb 12, 2013, at 12:38 PM, Clem Cole wrote:
On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 11:47 AM, <Paul_Koning at dell.com<mailto:Paul_Koning at
dell.com>> wrote:
Nothing. It was one of the most spectacular failures in DEC history. A whole new OS
(well, based on RSX I believe) and new hardware designed specifically for it (VT62),
canceled a week after it was first announced.
Interesting, I always though the 11/60 held that honor.
Hm... All I know about the 11/60 is that there were a few of them around the building I
worked. One of them was used by WPS-8 development (running RSTS) -- because the 11/60
was the fastest PDP-8 ever built thanks to custom microcode that implemented PDP-8
emulation.
paul