Computer Center

In the late 80s¹ the University of Arizona had a satellite link to the John von Neumann Center for our internet connectivity. The link itself was a 57Kbit satellite connection using that giant roof mounted antenna on top of the computer center.

One morning the VitaLink Corp Satellite NOC called us to see if we had lost power as they had lost signal from us.

Just in case someone needs to know what the value of decimal (75) is in Hexadecimal (4B) or Binary (0100 1011).

This was something you needed to know to manage the IDX-3000 x.25 Packet switch. 3000 was the number of Async. ports a single IDX processor could support. Later IDX created a way to link two IDX-3000 processors together.

We used the IDX-3000 to distribute Asynchronous based terminals across the campus. This was parallel to the Engineering Sytek and replacing the Computer Center PAC-X packet switch.

There used be a very large Aleppo pine tree in a grassy area between the northeast side of the Computer Center and Speedway Boulevard. Then around 1990 work began on a major Speedway widening project which would expand the roadway from four lanes to six lanes and create the three UofA pedestrian underpasses. The 95 year old, 65 foot tall tree was in the way and had to go. To save it, the UofA dug it up and relocated it to a large circular planter just west of the Warren Avenue underpass over by where Eric’s Ice Cream was (now 1702) where it happily lives today.