Re: What ever happened to... DEC?

["Gary L. Luckenbaugh" <garyll@ibm.net>]

It really is sad to see what has happened to DEC.  I've always held DEC in
high regard even though I went to work for one of their arch rivals (IBM).
I was once at a conference talking to some exhibiters from DEC and when I
walked away I overheard one of them say, "Can you believe that! An IBMer who
wishes he worked for DEC.", and they were absolutely right.  I knew quite a
few IBMers that were closet DEC fanatics.  The guys from IBM's research
division in Yorktowne Heights were particularly fond of DEC equipment, and
often used it in their research.  In IBM's Federal Systems Division, where I
worked, we even bid DEC hardware on a few government programs.  IBM
Corporate never liked this very much (maybe that's why they sold us off).  I
even found several DEC VAX machines in the bowels of IBM Boca Raton FL
(where the Series/1 and IBM PCs were developed) in the mid-1980s.  (We also
had a few closet Macintosh fanatics, but that's another story.  I once used
a Macintosh in 1985 to make presentation foils for a meeting with high level
management because the IBM PC couldn't do the job.)

Gary