[MaDeuce]

Pretty much the same story for me. When I first joined the Labs, I got a 5630 (the successor to the 5620), also called the 630 MTG. At the time, it was an impressive piece of equipment that was a huge improvement over a regular tty.

I found the video to be somewhat lacking in interesting technical details -- there really were a lot of neat things going on in the background to make it all happen.

Readers waxing nostalgic might enjoy Rob Pike's paper describing the 5620. It provides an in-depth look at what was going on behind the scenes.

http://doc.cat-v.org/bell_labs/blit/

Of course, I subsequently got a Sun 3/60 and never looked back. But it was fun while it lasted.

[kjs3]

Interesting...I've never heard the 630 called a 5630. Very cool. I actually played a little with a 730X (successor to 630 with ethernet and an X server in ROM) back in the dark ages. Layers was pretty rotted by then and it was a terrible XTerm, especially WRT to the hotrods NCD was cranking out. Kinda sad.

Yet another Tech Taking Over The World^TM that didn't. I've got some bubble memory and a Symbolics around here someplace.