Hi all, Let me tell you a little story. Many moons ago, while I was living away from Bristol, a man appeared at a meeting of the Bristol and Bath Linux User Group offering abundant gifts to all and sundry. Inside the boot of his car lay a treasure trove of Sun computers, as I understand, originating from the University of Bath. A number of these were taken by a LUG regular, a hacker of great skill named John Honniball, who took them in order to offer the gems to any who sought to learn the ways of the SPARC and the arcane magic of Engineering Workstations The Right Way. When I returned to Bristol I was honoured to be offered, and accept, a SPARCclassic from John.
Some years later, after I had left Bristol and returned again, another LUG regular, a Unix wizard from the University of Bristol's department of physics named Winnie Lacesso, notified us that there were a number of Sun workstations being disposed of by her department. (The same department providing part of the computing grid for the LHC no less.) I took the opportunity to visit the department and acquire a SPARCstation 4, along with two Sun monitors, from the learned folks. Now, I live in Liverpool. I have tinkered and explored and learned. I have gained a great deal from these gifts. However, I have moved on and I feel it is right that instead of gathering dust, these gems should again be offered to any who seek. So, in need of a good home are: * Sun SPARCclassic workstation, 64MB memory, 9GB SCSI disk http://www.obsolyte.com/sun_lx/ http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/6751/Sun-SPARCclassic/ The battery in the NVRAM has gone. If you're not familiar with NVRAM issues, see: http://www.lib.ru/TXT/faqsunnvram.txt and for an adventure to whose excitement I can personally attest: https://gigawa.lt/gigawa.lt/Sun_NVRAM.html * Sun SPARCstation 4 workstation, 64MB memory, 9GB SCSI disk https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARCstation_4 http://www.obsolyte.com/sun_ss5/ * Sun GDM-17E20 monitor http://www.shrubbery.net/~heas/sun-feh-2_1/Devices/Monitor/MONITOR_Color_17_Premium_CRT.html#365-1338 * Sun GDM-17E10 monitor http://www.shrubbery.net/~heas/sun-feh-2_1/Devices/Monitor/MONITOR_Color_17_Premium_CRT.html#365-1316 From what I recall (and the scribblings on the top of it), this monitor is unstable sometimes. Having just plugged it in, it displays the console fine but I haven't tried X with higher resolutions, or for an extended period. * I also have a type 6 keyboard and mouse. This was bought for £20 on eBay so that I could press two keys, Stop+N, in order to reset the NVRAM on the SPARCclassic and get the serial port back. A good lesson there: don't fiddle with the flow control settings of a serial port if said serial port is the only way to access a machine :-) As I paid for it, I'd like to have some token offering in return. * In Bristol, I have a monster 21" Sun monitor which needs two people to carry it safely (this is not a joke). If you wish to receive any of these, email me back and we'll sort something out. They are currently residing in Liverpool unless otherwise stated; if you want them and live further afield, let me know and we may be able to arrange something. First come, first served. Happy hacking, Bob