> As Eric, I'm a member of the PDP-1 Restoration Team. The PDP-1 restoration > was completed in 2005 - and annually we check the power supplies for voltage, > ripple, etc. Not one of the re-formed capacitors have failed in the ten years > since the completion of the restoration.
Did the team ever consider some sort of active monitoring of the power, beyond whatever DEC implemented? The big, chunky power supplies from the 1960s and 70s have the advantage that you can very often make completely reversible changes to the circuitry quite easily, due to all the screw terminals and the like - adding current and voltage sense points, crowbars, and other gizmos that just might save a transformer or two. And with today's technology, those gizmos could be very small and tucked away. -- Will
