eBay 170 -- MIDRANGE-L

Howdy,

I got a call this afternoon from one of my clients and they bought one of those
170's on eBay.

Now they want me to help them get it up to snuff and migrate them from their 200
that they have milked for about 6 or 7 years.

The owner of the business has some knowledge of computers and the AS/400 in
particular way beyond just knowing the buzz words.  (It's a manufacturing
company and he writes all the production queries and does his own data mining)

So I have been handed some limitations.  I hate it when that happens :)

What I am asking for is pointers to either manuals, people, or war stories about
what I am about to face.

>From what I can see the machine that they purchased is a 170 with processor
feature 2164 which puts them at a CPW of 210/29.  They currently have a CPW of
16.8 (although the CICS machines had a bias towards interactive) and both
machines are in the P10 group.  From this I gather that software price will not
cause sticker shock.

The web page at eBay has conflicting information about the OS level.  The text
above the specification bullets states that this IBM refurbished machine is at
V4R4, but the bullets say V4R2.  I'll have to see what we wind up with, but
where can I find out what it will take to get them to V4R5?  They do not need,
nor want V5R1 and for the next couple of months they can get what they are
after.  That is: RPG, PDM and Query.

They do not now or foresee that they will ever web host from their 400.  This is
just a replacement for their 200.  Not looking to add anything new.  No SQL, no
Websphere, no C, no Java, no Linux, no NT, no PASE, no COBOL, no Apache, no
email.  They are happy with the telnet and FTP that V3R2 has to offer.

The good side is that this machine has 1GB of memory as compared to their 128M
and from what I can see has 10 8GB drives with RAID as compared to their 4GB
total with nothing.  This tells me that the box has the side car to house the
additional drives and that means more expansion slots.  Both machines have
Ethernet connection and one comm port.  They currently have 2.5GB 1/4" tape and
that will change to 4GB.

This is the other part, beside OS upgrade cost, that I have questions about.
They have several high volume dot matrix printers (4234 IPDS and 6400 emulating
4234) that are, and would like to continue to be, twinax attached.  (If you want
to know why, just check the archives for things like copies and page range)  So
what is the cost and where can I purchase a twinax (single port) controller?
(Other than from IBM)

They also have a SPD ASCII workstation controller that they would like to
continue to use, but can live without.  The question is: does the 170 have any
SPD slots or is it all PCI.

I've tried looking for the above information at the IBM site but they are not
very accommodating to those looking for information on "legacy" equipment.

I know that I am asking a lot, but TIA for any info and pointers.

J. Kilgore

P.S. They paid $6k for this machine.  A new 270 with a CPW of 30, 512mb memory,
and RAID for 6 8GB drives starts at about $55k.