Real PDP11 model question

[Jerome H. Fine]

>Patrick Finnegan wrote:

> > On Wednesday 22 September 2004 10:49, Paul Koning wrote:
> >>  Jerome> Jerome Fine replies:
> >>  Jerome> Because of my requirement for 132 character text lines under
> >>  Jerome> VT100 editing (because I use MACRO-11 listings), only Windows
> >>  Jerome> 98 SE is able to provide this feature.
> > You can also do this in the Linux version.  You just have to use
> > xterm invoked with the right switches.
> Or, you could hook a real VT-100/420/etc up to a serial port and get
> perfect VT100 emulation.  On Linux, at least, I don't know if E11 will
> let you do that on Windows. :)

Jerome Fine replies:

YES!!  If there is a serial port on the Windows 98 SE motherboard,
then it is a standard part of E11:
ASSIGN  TT1 COM1:
At one point, I even had a real DEC  TU-58 drive hooked to the
COM2: port and was able to BOOT  RT-11 from a V3.x tape
with RT-11.

When I first started to use E11 in 1997, the 166 MHz Pentium
did not have the correct video card to handle 132 character
text lines under the editor within RT-11.  As suggested above,
I used a real VT100 connected to the serial port to look at
listings from MACRO-11.

However, when E11 and the hardware are compatible and
132 character text lines are possible, then E11 allows:

ASSIGN  TT0  CON1  (Alt/F1 - default - always done for the user)
ASSIGN  TT1  CON2  (Alt/F2)
ASSIGN  TT2  CON3  (Alt/F3)
......
ASSIGN  TT11 CON12 (Alt/F12)

Switching from Console (CON1, CON2, CON3, etc.) to
Console is done using the Alt/Fn key pairs.  As a result, the
monitor is able to handle up to 12 DIFFERENT emulated
terminals.  On the real DEC  PDP-11, I have 6 VT100 terminals
on my desk (stacked 2 high so only 3 are on the desk).  With
E11, I only have to use the Alt/Fn key pair to switch back and
forth.  Other than forgetting which Console is which, I can't
look at more than one Console at a time in any case - or have
not found a way to did it as yet;)

PLUS, since the output is via the AGP card on the Pentium III,
the speed of output is just a bit faster than 9600 baud on a
serial port.

As for the current differences between hobby and Full E11,
John Wilson has expanded the hobby memory to the full
4 MBytes and the total emulated hard disk drives up to
256 MBytes.  The hobby version can't use the BCI card
nor can "raw" SCSI drives be used.  Also, RAM: disk
drives are not supported.  BUT, for hobby users, I do
not see that as a major problem under RT-11.

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine
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