Extremely brief history of PDP computers
0 comments · hardware, historical
- Comments6
0 comments · hardware, historical
Story details from Lobsters ↗ · linked article on entropicthoughts.com.
Extremely brief history of PDP computers was first seen on Lobsters · Hottest on Oct 29, 2026. Since then it has appeared in 57 checks on 4 different days. Its best position was #4 of 25, reached on Nov 1, 03:21 UTC. It dropped off the list after Nov 2, 02:51 UTC. The same link also trended on Hacker News, which raises its cross-platform score.
Position on Lobsters · Hottest at every check (lower is better).
Best rank per day (UTC).
Platform metric as reported by Lobsters.
| List | Best | Days | Checks | Last seen |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lobsters · Hottest | #4 | 4 | 57 | |
| YHacker News · Front page Brief History of PDP Computers | same link | |||
A few top-level comments from Lobsters, shortened. Read the full thread on Lobsters.
I quibble a bit with the bottom. VAX was intended more as a follow-on to the PDP-11 than the PDP-10. It was even _called_ VAX-11 initially. It certainly subsumed that class of _system_ but I don't think that was the original intent, and architecturally it was closer to the 11s.
Agreed, the PDP-11 was a minicomputer and the PDP-10 was a mainframe. The VAX was a minicomputer with clear PDP-11 heritage. Over time DEC did a good job covering low to high end with it and VAXclustering pushed it into unique space that covered the need of a separate mainframe ISA.
If you're in western Pennsylvania and like old computers you might want to visit the Large Scale Systems Museum: https://www.mact.io/
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Not at the moment. It was last on the list on Nov 2, 02:51 UTC, after 4 days of trending.
#4 on Lobsters · Hottest, on Nov 1, 03:21 UTC. Trendoday checks this list every 30 minutes.
It was first seen on Oct 29, 2026 and has been on the list on 4 days (57 checks) since.