[ILUG] AlphaServer going free

[Denis Hennessy]

Hi Guys,

I saw this on a freecycle mailing list I'm on. I figured this list has
probably a higher chance of having someone that might like a project
to boot linux on this puppy. I'm pasting the original post below, if
anyone's interested mail me and I'll send you the original so you can
contact the owner.

Just in case you hadn't heard of freecycle, it's a set of groups where
people give away stuff that they don't want for free (so it doesn't
end up in a landfill). See
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/freecyclewicklow/ for more info.

/dh

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This one is for the die-hard computer heads, so if you're not into
computers, and particularly old ones at that,  save yourself the bother of
reading it!

The machine on offer is an old DEC AlphaServer. It's big, as computers go
- easily the size of three regular PC towers strapped together. It was
originally purchased in 1997 for an embarrassingly large amount of money,
but given that my iPod has 6 times the storage capacity, and my 2- year
old PDA has a faster CPU, I think this is the correct marketplace for it's
current value!

It's vital statistics, in brief, are: 333Mhz DEC Alpha Processor, 10 GB
(!) Hard disk capacity (between 3 removable non-RAIDed SCSI drives),
CD-ROM, 8mm 'EXABYTE' tape drive, two network interface cards. Windows
NT4.0 installed, up to SP6, (I think!) but obviously that's completely
unsupported by anyone anymore. It will allegedly run Tru64 Linux, although
I've never had time to experiment with that, and I think there's some sort
of limited version of VMS on it, (hardly surprising given its heritage)
although I'd walk backwards across the English Channel before I'd remember
the boot sequence to get into it.

If you want it, let me know soon as it's kind of in the way around here.
I'm leaving the job shortly and I'd like to see it go to a good home
rather than the  computer-breakers; I have a lot of memories associated
with this old box. Names (and I'm not expecting many responses) will go
into a hat.

It's essential that you are able to collect this item from Dublin 4.