Retro computing enthusiasts have published the PiDP-10 project, aimed at creating a working reconstruction of the DEC PDP-10 mainframe, model KA10 from 1968. A new plastic case for the control panel has been made, equipped with 124 vacuum tube indicators and 74 switches. The computing components and software environment are recreated using a Raspberry Pi 5 board with the Raspberry Pi OS distribution based on Debian, and the SIMH toolkit that supports full simulation of the PDP-10, including the reproduction of known bugs.
The emulator can run the multitasking and multiuser operating system TOPS-10, which was originally supplied on PDP-10 mainframes. An alternative operating system, ITS, developed in 1967 at MIT for the PDP-10, is also supported as an option. More than 400 historical applications, restored from MIT's tape archives, are available for ITS. The code for the components used in the project and the installation automation script are published on GitHub. A community-developed build toolkit was used to launch ITS.
An event for putting the PiDP-10 into operation is scheduled for April 1 at the Computer Museum at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which will be combined with a seminar on the history of PDP-10 usage at MIT. Future plans mention creating similar clones for computers Whirlwind (1945), PDP-1 (1959), PDP-8 (1968), and PDP-11/70 (1975). The project is also engaged in a complete reconstruction of the computing center space with the PDP-10, allowing a full immersion into the atmosphere of computing technology from the 1960s.
Source: opennet.ru
