Re: CISC (ugh!) question

I seem to remember having 64M of EMC memory in a B60, but I could not
swear to that; I coul not even say that it was the maximum possible.

If 48M is truly the maximum for a B50 it may be a marketing
restriction as much as a technical one.

48 may not be a power of 2 but 32 and 16 both are....

On Fri, Sep 30, 2011 at 10:27 AM, John McKee <jmmckee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

 A few weeks ago, I saw something on the list about how a modern system (can't recall if the system referred to was a 270 or whatever).  Just remember that "the doctor" described the possible memory expansion for it.  And that expansion was not "official" from IBM as I recall.

Which brought this nagging question to mind.  There is no practical value to any answer - except pure unrelenting curiosity.  I worked with a B50.  It was purchased with 24M of RAM.  Prior to my arrival, a deal was made to swap the genuine IBM memory for 48M of IPL memory.  That system was loaded down beyond belief.

I was told that 48M was the absolute maximum memory that the B50 could address.

This was obviously way before any customer oriented maintenance on a RISC system.

Was 48M the absolute maximum memory that the old beast could support?

My assumption, based on tremendous change in nearly 20 years is that 48M was indeed the maximum.  But, why 48?  Not a power of 2.


John McKee
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