The one challenging aspect of restoration, particularly Data General is the lack of information available on-line when compared to competitors of their time e.g. Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC). The internet is awash with manuals and schematics for a vast amount of DEC equipment yet there is very little (save for the very early Nova’s) available. This is a real problem when your presented with a system or item that you are not familiar with and have no documentation for yourself. I was in this position with my first restoration and I reached out to as many people as I could find on the net to ask for help (if they could).
This section is intended as a thank you to those that have helped me along the way. Without all of you I would not be as far forward as I am today with my projects. The list is in no particular order:
Mario (Germany)
Without Mario there is NO doubt that I would not have been able to progress the MV/9800 project very far at all. Until I came across Mario I had had the 9800 for 3 months and managed to achieve very little due to the lack of documentation (in the main). Mario is ex Data General and has been able to supply vast amounts of technical information on the 9600, 9800 and SCSI II PCB’s. He has also been able to supply me with some missing BMC cables and back-plane plugs which has allowed me to build a back-plane to SCSI connector so I can work on the storage side of the MV/9800 restoration. Thank you Mario for all that you have done for me – I am truly grateful.
Tommie (Sweden)
Tommie is a fellow collector and has provided wise council as well as introducing me to other collectors he knows. I am grateful to Tommie for the introductions and for his website reference. Tommie also owns an Eagle (MV/8000)! Thank you Tommie.
Lothar (Germany)
Lothar is another fellow collector and a very technical one at that! He owns a MV/4000, MV/7800 and MV/15000. Lothar was introduced to me via Tommie and has helped me with BMC termination. He has also been a great help testing my 6125 controller and cables. Thanks for you help Lothar!
Stephen (France)
Stephen is another fellow collector and has a very interesting site which the history of the later DG machines and the restoration of his MV/2000 (DC). He has documented the use of flash memory to replace SCSI disks on DG controllers. He has also authored DasherG a terminal emulator.
Carl (USA)
Carl is an avid collector of 16bit systems and has quite a collection! Carl has been helping me with the MTP/100 and also introduced me to Bruce. Thank you Carl.
Bruce (USA)
Bruce is without doubt the Data General ‘Oracle’! He has been able to provide a vast amount of information on the products I have been able to acquire to date. Not just manuals and documentation but valuable insight in to a products history. His company WildHare has also developed some interesting Hardware and Software products to enable legacy Data General Operating Systems to run on modern hardware as well as developing a flash based storage PCB that emulates legacy Data General peripherals and in 2019 has launched a modern replacement for the NOVA CPU with inbuilt flash storage to emulate DG peripherals. Thank you Bruce.
Thomas (Switzerland)
Thomas is a owner of an MPT/100 Desktop which was used for 25 years as part of an electric locomotive simulator in the Swiss Museum of Transport. The MPT/100 as connected to an analogue computer and projector, when the exhibit was finally withdrawn from the museum Thomas salvaged it from going to scrap.
Thanks for the information Thomas!
John (USA)
John has kindly sent me his Pharaoh system which he used in the field during his time with Data General Field Engineering. In addition John was also kind enough to send me some diagnostic tapes along with 1000’s of microfiche used by Field Engineering. Thank you John.
Alexandre (France)
Alexandre has kindly sent a connecting cable and terminator for the microNova I/O bus which will allow me to connect my 5Mb Winchester to the MPT/100. He worked for Data General in a senior capacity for over 21 years on MicroNova, Nova, Eclipse, MV, Clariion and Aviion. Thank you Alexandre.