The CS department's retrocomputer lab has made significant progress restoring the oldest computer on campus to operation. The lab will be open to demonstrate the machine on Tuesday 5/5 and Thursday 5/7 during the last week of classes, from 10AM to noon and 1:30PM to 4:30PM. All are welcome to drop in and visit.
Where: The lab is in the basement of Jessup Hall, in room B1N. Go down the south stairwell of Jessup all the way to the bottom and then through the door to the left ahead of you.
What: The PDP-8 computer, serial number 85, has a 12-bit word and 4K words of memory. it was delivered to the UI psychology department in 1965 to control lab instrumentation, and it cost $30,000 dollars.
CS students working with Douglas Jones have been restoring this machine since 2012, and most of the CPU and all of the memory now works reliably enough to run a variety of small demonstrations. Only one I/O device works, a Teletype (keyboard-printer). The machine also has a high-speed paper-tape punch and reader, a graphics output subsystem, and a multi-channel analog-to-digital converter. Work will continue over the summer and into the fall if anyone is interested in helping with this project. It's a fun way to learn some low-level hardware and software.
If you're interested, take a look at:
Doug Jones douglas-w-jones@uiowa.edu