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DIY CPU Demo'd Running Minix
DeviceGuru writes "Bill Buzbee offered the first public demonstration of the open-source Minix OS — a cousin of Linux — running on his homebrew minicomputer, the Magic-1, at the Vintage Computer Festival in Mountain View, Calif. The Magic-1 minicomputer is built with 74-series TTL ICs using wire-wrap construction, and implements a homebrew, 8086-like ISA. Rather than using a commercial microprocessor, Buzbee created his own microcoded CPU that runs at 4.09 MHz, and is in the same ballpark as an old 8086 in performance and capabilities. The CPU has a 22-bit physical address bus and an 8-bit data bus."
Does it run Linux... I mean minix.. I mean... Oh forget it!
Nyhetsankaret.com -- det bÃsta av Sveriges Nyhetssido
Beowulf Cluster
the open-source Minix OS [CC] -- a cousin of Linux
That must be the same sense in which Dick Cheney is "a cousin of" Barak Obama.
I would really want to do this! I'm sure that the thing doesn't have an ethernet device, but I wonder if a terminal server device would do? Then I'd run some sort of web services on it. :) That'd be some true geek value.
Did he use appropriate era memory, you know the ol' 1k chips, meaning 1024 by 1?
Core memory? Hey kids, instead of stringing popcorn this holiday, we are gonna do memory cores!
Cool none the less.
OBVIOUSLY the guy stole the code for Minix from SCO. Lawsuit at 11.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
From the site about the homemade processor:
/. to a server that's only running at 4 MHz? Have you no mercy?" My response: Nope.)
Except when I'm working on it, Magic-1 is connected to the net. It serves web pages at http://www.magic-1.org
Not any more!
(I know, I know, some of you might be thinking..."How could you be so cruel as to post a link on
...in this picture translate to "I WILL NEVER GET LAID" in binary.
The neutrality of this sig is disputed.
I can just picture Woz now saying "The force is strong in this one. "
Where is the "+1 Deliciously Paraniod" moderation option when you need it.
"I don't necessarily agree with everything I say." - Marshall McLuhan
He's just a fucking script kiddie as far as I'm concerned. Real men mine and smelt their own metal. Consumer metal bought over the counter just doesn't offer enough customisability if you really want to do a project like this right.
Or even worse, they'd wire the multihop nets in a daisy chain pattern.
It's the Homebrew Computer Club all over again. Back to the 80's.
Wonder if he'll warrant a Slashdot story in about 15 years when he homebrews a 3D graphics card?
2Gb RAM, 3GHz CPU, 20Gb of disk - Windows Vista: 1
4Mb RAM, 4MHz CPU, 500Kb ram disk - Minix: ?
Deleted
So we're trying to find enough food and water to survive, and you're sat in the back shed trying to jemmy together a soldering iron and some transistors? I'll be delighted to find you're on my team.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
Nice job, but if he was a real "man" he wouldn't have used advanced circuits like TTL. He should have wired it using 2N3904 and 2N3906 transistors using RTL (Resistor/Transistor/Logic) instead of taking the easy way out and using that new-fangled TTL stuff. And when he gets real serious, he can start with triode tubes (ala Eniac / Multics), then he will really have demonstrated his manhood (or lunacy).
It says NOTHING about his sexual activity.
... but it does indicate that, unlike the typical Slashdotter (parent's basement and all) this man is not only capable of reproducing but has done so. Regardless of what you think of his homebrew processor, he should get points for successfully assembling offspring.
Maybe not
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Abraham begat Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Judas and his brethren ...
...
...
... yadda, yadda, yadda,
... and Multics begat Unix; and Unix begat Minix and his brethren; and Minix begat Linux