Wang OIS system info needed

[NeXT]

Here's something really interesting that one of my friends came across a while ago. We never figured out how to use it but I'm still wanting to know.

It is apparently a Wang OIS server with a hard drive and a floppy drive and that's all we know.

Here are photographs:

It would be really interesting to find out what it can do and see if we can get a console on it. Does anyone have any information on this system?

 

[Chuck(G)]

I assume that you've seen this site?

Your system appears to have IWS capabilities. I suspect the owner of the above site can help you with connecting up a keyboard and monitor.

 

[Terry Yager]

Hang a terminal off it?

--T

 

[cosam]

Hang a terminal off it?

Yeah - if it was mine I'd have stuck a terminal on that RS-232 port to see if anything popped up.

Interesting find, although I suspect you might need to find one of the matching workstations to make much use of it.

Do I spy a Micropolis 1325 MFM disk drive up top there? If so I hope it fares better than the two I've had... they don't have the best reputation as far as reliability goes.

 

[Chuck(G)]

Interesting find, although I suspect you might need to find one of the matching workstations to make much use of it.

This unit appears to be configured with 4 IWS (integrated workstation) ports. That is, the workstation "guts" are on cards inside the box; only a keyboard and monitor need be supplied.

The Wang external workstation interface is pretty unusual--4.5MHz serial data over coax.

BTW is that your OIS 70 being powered up on YouTube? Looks like the same one.

 

[cosam]

This unit appears to be configured with 4 IWS (integrated workstation) ports. That is, the workstation "guts" are on cards inside the box; only a keyboard and monitor need be supplied.

Aah, that would indeed make things easier! I was under the impression that the workstations were a bit smarter than your average dumb terminal, but that was supposedly another set-up all together.

The Wang external workstation interface is pretty unusual--4.5MHz serial data over coax.

That sounds like the beginnings of a non-trivial project right there ;-)

 

[NeXT]

BTW is that your OIS 70 being powered up on YouTube? Looks like the same one.

Yep. That's the one.

 

[pine-koan]

I assume that you've seen this site?

Your system appears to have IWS capabilities. I suspect the owner of the above site can help you with connecting up a keyboard and monitor.

That's funny - that's my old site from way back when I lived in Michigan. I guess the ISP forgot to delete the account.

I've worked with these (OIS) systems for a very long time. I still have quite a collection of hardware, software, and documentation. They were most commonly used for their word processing capability.