[comp.misc] Anybody know anything about "Cimlink" CAD workstations?

dag@per2.UUCP (Daniel A. Glasser) (06/22/89)

I have been given the opportunity to make an offer on a Cimlink
(or is it spelled Cimlync, I'm not sure) color workstation.  This
machine has the following known features:

	10MHz M68000 CPU
	6MB Dual ported RAM
	SCSI disc interface
	SCSI->ST-506 + Floppy board (OMTI?)
	86MB hard drive (don't know manufacturer, speed or RLL vs. MFM)
	5.25" 760k floppy (might be 1.2mb, but the fs I looked at on a
		floppy had only 760k or thereabouts...)
	6 serial ports
	1 keyboard port with VT100 style serial keyboard
	Ethernet (thick wire) port
	19" color monitor
	1088x860 (or thereabouts) 16 color video
	Very large power supply and "blast hardened" cased.
	BSD 4.2 (or is it 4.3)

I don't know many things about this machine, and the people trying to
sell it don't know as much as I do.  This machine was sold bundled with
some CAD software which has since been moved off onto Sun workstations.

I suspect that the CPU board is an OEM product, but was unable to pull
any of the board in the cardcage.  There were about 9 of them in all.
The video may be proprietary.  The manufacturer of Cimlink claims that
they get an effective 4x resolution increase through proprietary anti-
aliasing techniques, but I suspect that that's only in the CAD package,
which does not come with the machine at this stage.

Is anyone out there familiar with this machine?  I would like to know
if it is worth getting, and if so, how much should I offer?

Other questions I would like answered are:

	Does this 68k system have some sort of proprietary MMU
		for rudimentary relocation and protection operations?

	Can an end user obtain programming information for the video
		subsystem?  I would want to get X windows for it, which
		may mean that I will have to port the server myself.
		(It has some windowing system which the documents
		that the people I spoke with had called Cim Shell.)

	Can the keyboard be replaced by a more reasonable one?

Please send replies via E-mail.  If there is any useful response, I'll
summarize to comp.sys.m68k.

					Thanks.
						Daniel A. Glasser
-- 
 _____________________________________________________________________________
    Daniel A. Glasser                           One of those things that goes
    uwvax!per2!dag                              "BUMP!!!(ouch)" in the night. 
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