Title: Hello from Wisconsin!
Post by: nandrews on May 13, 2022, 04:30:40 PM
Post by: nandrews on May 13, 2022, 04:30:40 PM
Howdy, all, from Madison, Wisconsin. Longtime NeXT fan, recent owner.
I was given a small collection a few months back, in dirty but operating condition. The late owner was an original NeXT developer who worked in geoinformatics.
This is what I have:
The systems were still set up, as the owner had left them. Of course all the rubber has melted, and everything is covered with a fine layer of basement grit and dust. But they booted immediately upon battery replacement, and I was able to get root easily and set up new accounts.
I will be imaging the drives when I am able, in case there's anything on there that's rare or precious to the community (so far, I've found some demo software and the commercial packages I expected to see from the installation media I was given (oh, and a bunch of porn — which, on a 2-bit display, leaves just about everything to the imagination. ;D)
For now, they're living in my storage space. I'm setting up some new workspace now, and expect to install one of the Cubes in a place of honor at that point.
I was given a small collection a few months back, in dirty but operating condition. The late owner was an original NeXT developer who worked in geoinformatics.
This is what I have:
- Two original booting N1000 Cubes with 68040 logic board upgrades (68030 boards retained in 68040 upgrade boxes), Quantum HDs.
- Two MegaPixel displays, keyboards, mice, original cords
- One NeXTSTation Turbo, no HD
- Two NeXT Laser Printers, boxed
- One SCSI floppy drive
- Two shelving units full of NeXT software, manuals, magazines, and miscellaneous promotional materials
The systems were still set up, as the owner had left them. Of course all the rubber has melted, and everything is covered with a fine layer of basement grit and dust. But they booted immediately upon battery replacement, and I was able to get root easily and set up new accounts.
I will be imaging the drives when I am able, in case there's anything on there that's rare or precious to the community (so far, I've found some demo software and the commercial packages I expected to see from the installation media I was given (oh, and a bunch of porn — which, on a 2-bit display, leaves just about everything to the imagination. ;D)
For now, they're living in my storage space. I'm setting up some new workspace now, and expect to install one of the Cubes in a place of honor at that point.
Title: Re: Hello from Wisconsin!
Post by: nextchef on May 13, 2022, 05:19:45 PM
Post by: nextchef on May 13, 2022, 05:19:45 PM
Welcome, and what a nice haul you have found!
Yes to imaging those HD's as soon as you can, as you never know what else might be squirreled away that could prove valuable to the community.
Yes to imaging those HD's as soon as you can, as you never know what else might be squirreled away that could prove valuable to the community.
Title: Re: Hello from Wisconsin!
Post by: barcher174 on May 13, 2022, 06:28:26 PM
Post by: barcher174 on May 13, 2022, 06:28:26 PM
Welcome!
Title: Re: Hello from Wisconsin!
Post by: Rob Blessin Black Hole on May 14, 2022, 07:52:19 PM
Post by: Rob Blessin Black Hole on May 14, 2022, 07:52:19 PM
Welcome aboard... hmmm sounds perilous rescuing dormant Cubes from a 2 bit grey scale prehistoric porn fetish dragon on painfully slow optical disk drives or screaming hard drives, formerly located in some kind of retro computer Dungeon , you are my hero lol I've and seen and rescued worse .I n the day remember Max our sys admin back in the day showing the sales guy what looked like computer gibberish code pre web then dropping it into a NeXT graphics app and a few minutes later a playboy center fold would appear on screen usually about the time the boss or secretary walked in lol or better yet a tour group . Sometimes it was like yikes , why in the hell are you clowns sending this around you are obviously in the wrong section of the internet . I asked my customers Tim Berners Lee inventor of the World Wide Web on NeXT Cubes back in the day, a question about what to do about rampant development of internet porn and security against it. He response throughout history there will always be those that chose to eat the forbidden fruit from low hanging branches not much can be done as it is inevitably their decision. I thought well said I come across it on old NeXTs occasionally and my choice is to just delete it permanently with a fresh install. That being said NeXT Cubes and software from me lol upended these Acacia patent trolls effort wanting to enforce a royalty fee for every single picture, video and sound we all uploaded or downloaded through the web good and bad https://www.forbes.com/2004/07/20/cz_sl_0720acacia.html?sh=886718f6bb86 and we won Fisch and Richardson , saving us all thousands of dollars , I only charged $10K lol man oh man Acacia was pissed as they were trying to fleece companies north of $800 million. See NeXT Cubes prior art (we) were Capable of sending sound, video and graphics through email in 1989 -92 years ahead of the patents as well as the web, I can only imagine if Acacia was successful we all would still be paying them nickle, dime and quarter to this day for all images not just porn aka selfies we posted to the web yikes. :)
Title: Re: Hello from Wisconsin!
Post by: crimsonRE on May 23, 2022, 03:36:54 PM
Post by: crimsonRE on May 23, 2022, 03:36:54 PM
Excellent! The black hardware sure is durable - the original full-height 670MB HD in my '030 NeXT Computer is still running, over 30 years later (I can't imagine what that drive cost back in 1989). My MO drive has died - either of yours still alive? I did image the couple of MOs that came with it (original source code for the port of the mathematics package Maple to NextStep)...
Do keep them alive and kicking - plenty of tips and software still available, pointers are all here on nextcomputers.org...
Do keep them alive and kicking - plenty of tips and software still available, pointers are all here on nextcomputers.org...