bshafer@udenva.cair.du.edu (Bob Shafer) (06/05/89)
There is a company called DUAL that makes a UNIX box. Has anyone ever heard of them? Is there anybody that actually has touched one? Are they any good? I would be interested if anyone has had any experience with them, good or bad. Thanks, Bob Shafer Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries Internet: bshafer@du.edu BITNET: BSHAFER@DUCAIR Usenet: ...ncar!dunike!bshafer
szirin@cbnewsm.ATT.COM (seth.zirin) (06/06/89)
In article <11791@duorion.cair.du.edu> bshafer@dunike.UUCP (Bob Shafer) writes: >There is a company called DUAL that makes a UNIX box. Has anyone ever >heard of them? Is there anybody that actually has touched one? Are >they any good? I'll probably be flamed and corrected, but... DUAL was one of the first (the first?) commercial 68000/UNIX\(rg boxes around and their v7 came from Unisoft and was called UNIPLUS+\(rg. I never touched one of their boxes but I did see one at the Unisoft porting lab. A company named Megadata (Bohemia. NY) was also one of the 68000/UNIX pioneers and their v7 came from Unisoft as well. Megadata's boxes were (are?) pretty good (I did many of the device drivers :-) ). seth.zirin@att.com
arul@sdsu.UUCP (Arul Ananthanarayanan) (06/08/89)
In article <11791@duorion.cair.du.edu> bshafer@dunike.UUCP (Bob Shafer) writes: >There is a company called DUAL that makes a UNIX box. [ stuff deleted ] > >Bob Shafer > We still have our DUAL Systems 83/20 MC68000 S-100 based Unix box that we got in 1982. It still works albeit slowly. At the time we got it it was a pretty good machine. It runs V7 unix, we had System III up for awhile but it didn't work so hot. We used it pretty heavily for a few years before we got faster hardware. Hasn't seen much action since the last student who ported Xinu to it graduated. I don't know if the company is still in operation. Arul -- UUCP: ....!ucsd!sdsu!arul work:(619) 594-7207 ARPA: arul%sdsu.uucp@ucsd.edu home:(619) 583-0439
stone@nbc1.UUCP (Anthony Stone) (06/09/89)
Yes, the station where I used to work, KVUE-TV in Austin, still uses their
Dual 83/80. It's a S100-based 68000 computer with a SMD controller,
floppy controller, 1 megabytes of memory, 16 serial ports and clock card.
(I think a tape controller and ethernet card were also available.)
It's running Unisoft's System V port called Uniplus+. Dual also made
larger systems, but our SMD drive was only 80MB. For its time, the Dual
was a great product for those who wanted "real" UNIX but couldn't spend much
more than for a PC.
I saved an article posted last year by Erik Fair (Hi Erik!), who performed
assorted wizardry for Dual Systems from March '83 to June '86. Here's further
information about Dual from his posting <18758@apple.Apple.COM>.
Ian Darwin of SoftQuad (Toronto, Canada) has a Dual, and has been
running a mailing list of sorts for Dual owners for a few years.
He can be reached at <ian@sq.com>. This should help in finding Dual
owners who have reconfiguration rights.
Well over half of the Dual computers ever sold went into the People's
Republic of China (some apparently without proper export licenses, which
led to the recent conviction of Dual's former president on charges of
export regulation violations), so finding customers in the U.S. might not
be easy.
Sadly, Dual Systems finally closed its doors on September 1 of this
year. [1988]
--
Anthony Stone NBC Computer Imaging, New York, NY
stone@nbc1.ge.com 212-664-2206root@mjbtn.MFEE.TN.US (Mark J. Bailey) (06/09/89)
In article <3833@sdsu.UUCP>, arul@sdsu.UUCP (Arul Ananthanarayanan) writes: > In article <11791@duorion.cair.du.edu> bshafer@dunike.UUCP (Bob Shafer) writes: > >There is a company called DUAL that makes a UNIX box. > [ stuff deleted ] > > > >Bob Shafer > > > > We still have our DUAL Systems 83/20 MC68000 S-100 based Unix box that > [stuff deleted here also] > > I don't know if the company is still in operation. > A freind of mine took a job with a locak company which also had a Dual MC68000 cpu. It also ran Unix V7 by UniSoft (which also had some Berkeleyisms worked in). UniSoft is still around as he was able to contact them over the net. But I am afraid that we discovered Dual was long since out of business. It met the same fate another company called 'Callen' did. We finally determined that there was not much that could be done to upgrade the box. Mark. -- Mark J. Bailey "Ya'll com bak naw, ya hear!" USMAIL: 511 Memorial Blvd., Murfreesboro, TN 37129 ___________________________ VOICE: +1 615 893 0098 | JobSoft UUCP: ...!{ames,mit-eddie}!killer!mjbtn!mjb | Design & Development Co. DOMAIN: mjb@mjbtn.MFEE.TN.US | Murfreesboro, TN USA
bshafer@udenva.cair.du.edu (Bob Shafer) (06/10/89)
I thank everyone who has replied to my original request for information. Including a person who at one time worked at Dual and the keeper of a mailing list for users of old Dual equipment. The consensus appears to be that the company has gone out of business. However, I just received sales literature from someone in Denver that is selling stuff for Dual Systems Corporation. It includes a phone number if anyone is interested in verifying it's existence or not (we will either go with a MIPS (a real nice special for the educational market this month) or an 80386 implementation. The phone number is (415)785-8890. The sales literature says they are selling a box with a 68030 on a VME bus. They also are selling their VME controllers separately. I am not sure if this is the same company that everyone else thought was defunct, but there does appear to be a company named Dual that sells Unix boxes now. Bob Shafer Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries Internet: bshafer@du.edu BITNET: BSHAFER@DUCAIR Usenet: ...ncar!dunike!bshafer
bridget@unisoft.UUCP (Bridget Dobbins) (06/12/89)
In article <676@cbnewsm.ATT.COM> szirin@cbnewsm.ATT.COM (seth.zirin) writes: >In article <11791@duorion.cair.du.edu> bshafer@dunike.UUCP (Bob Shafer) writes: >>There is a company called DUAL that makes a UNIX box. Has anyone ever >>heard of them? Is there anybody that actually has touched one? Are >>they any good? > >DUAL was one of the first (the first?) commercial 68000/UNIX\(rg boxes >around and their v7 came from Unisoft and was called UNIPLUS+\(rg. I > >A company named Megadata (Bohemia. NY) was also one of the 68000/UNIX >pioneers and their v7 came from Unisoft as well. Megadata's boxes >were (are?) pretty good (I did many of the device drivers :-) ). Dual Systems, which was founded in Berkeley, California, in the late 1970s went bankrupt almost a year ago. Megadata, however, is still alive and well. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bridget Dobbins UniSoft Corp. {uunet,ucbvax,sun}!unisoft!bridget Emeryville, CA
hjg@amms4.UUCP (Harry Gross) (06/27/89)
>>In article <11791@duorion.cair.du.edu> bshafer@dunike.UUCP (Bob Shafer) writes: >>>There is a company called DUAL that makes a UNIX box. Has anyone ever >>>heard of them? Is there anybody that actually has touched one? Are >>>they any good? I had occasion to use the DUAL/Unisoft systems in the early 80's. They were excruciatingly slow. I never did find out if it was the hardware or the software. It certainly couldn't have been the number of users, as there were only about 6 or seven per machine :-). >In article <676@cbnewsm.ATT.COM> szirin@cbnewsm.ATT.COM (seth.zirin) writes: >>DUAL was one of the first (the first?) commercial 68000/UNIX\(rg boxes >>around and their v7 came from Unisoft and was called UNIPLUS+\(rg. In article <2080@unisoft.UUCP> bridget@unisoft.UUCP (Bridget Dobbins) writes: >Dual Systems, which was founded in Berkeley, California, in the late 1970s >went bankrupt almost a year ago. If memory serves correctly, the DUAL boxes were based on the S-100 bus (from CP/M fame) (or was it the Intel Multi-bus they used? Now I am not sure). This might help to explain their demise :-) -- Harry | reserved for | something really Internet: hjg@amms4.UUCP (we're working on registering)| clever - any UUCP: {jyacc, qtny, rna, bklyncis}!amms4!hjg | suggestions?