[PopePompus]

I think the handwriting was on the wall when the VAX 8600 was introduced. It was introduced 7ish years after the 11/780, and was only a few times faster. Today, in the twilight years of Moore's Law, a factor of a few speedup over 7 years would not be all that bad, but back then it was shocking. I felt the VAX line was a slowly sinking ship from that point on.

[sillywalk]

Also, the PRISM/MICA project got cancelled so Dave Cutler (and whomever he took with him) left for Microsoft.

Then they tried MIPS for a while, and I think(?) PRISM became the basis for the Alpha. Also the other 'minicomputers' - IBM AS/400 came out in 1988, and the HP3000 switched to PA-RISC.

[__d]

The DECstation line was MIPS-based, and DEC sold Ultrix, a BSD-based Unix.

I used a 2100, 3100, 4000/25, and 4000/125 (?) I think. They were decent workstations for their time.

[rahen]

I would choose a VAXi-11/780 if its appearance wasn't so plain and dull. In comparison, the early PDP-10s, particularly the KA-10 and KI-10, are charming. They are probably the epitome of computer aesthetic alongside the 11/40-45-70 series.

[sillywalk]

Do you happen to know what the KA and KL prefixes stand for?

[rahen]

I'm uncertain about the 'A' in KA, it might suggest that it was the initial release.

'I' stands for 'Integrated', as it was the first PDP-10 CPU to utilize ICs, and 'L' stands for 'LSI'.

There was also the ill-fated KC-10, which was unfortunately killed for various reasons, both technical and strategic as it was competing with the 11/780. It was to use integrated NAND chips like the 11/750 (or even the Cray 1). I'm not sure what the 'C' stood for.

Oh, I should also mention the small KS-10, which had a mini form factor (the DEC10-20 was a mainframe). I guess you can figure what the 'S' stood for.