Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!apple!baum From: baum@Apple.COM (Allen J. Baum) Newsgroups: comp.arch Subject: Re: History of personal computing (LONG Message-ID: <15355@apple.Apple.COM> Date: 10 Aug 88 18:15:27 GMT References: <5946@venera.isi.edu> <46500024@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu> Reply-To: baum@apple.UUCP (Allen Baum) Organization: Apple Computer, Inc. Lines: 16 [] >In article <46500024@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu> mcdonald@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu writes: >>In fact the DG Nova was a 16-bit version of a 12-bit machine (the PDP-8) >>and architecturally is atrocious compared to the PDP-11 at least in my >>opinion. I don't believe there is much resemblance between a PDP-8 and a Nova, even accounting for 16 vs. 12 bit words. The Nova was a Load/Store architecture, the first as far as I know. The rumors that go around are that it was designed at DEC to replace the PDP-8. The design was turned down, and the founders left DEC to form DG. The PDP-11 won the design contest, and came out a few years later. If you want to see a 16 bit version of the PDP-8, check out the HP-21xx series of computers. A direct ripoff, in almost every respect. -- {decwrl,hplabs,ihnp4}!nsc!apple!baum (408)973-3385