Once upon a thirty years, a Chernobyl Zone replica Soviet computer starts up
Restoring Exclusion-Zone hardware while encroaching on a contemporary.A functional PC that uses the same hardware as the models used in and around the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone has been put together by Chornobyl Family, a Slovakia-based YouTube channel that specialises in locating and restoring Soviet-era equipment.
As you might expect, it’s challenging to find hardware and software that even enables such a Frankenstein build to function. However, it still functions in black and yellow.
They produced the original mainframe-style computers they were inspired by (and used components from), including difficult-to-find clones of Intel’s 8086 processors, by Minsk Mainframes. Only 80,000 EC-1841 mainframes were produced; some remained in service well into the 1990s; this was a symptom of semiconductor yields in the 1980s. It has an enduring rhythm of transformation. But there’s a catch: they claim that the Chornobyl Family’s particular CPU is a military variant of the ES-1841 CPU known as the ES-1845, which was commonly utilised by the KGB.
No, you couldn’t run Crysis (or an AI model…) on it because the CPUs in these mainframes typically ran at 5 MHz. However, it was capable of running alphaDOS, a DOS clone heavily translated by the Soviet Union. Software is a limited resource as well, which usually forces electronics restorers to go on a virtual software quest.
Can you imagine how difficult it would be to search through the few floppy discs still in use today to discover the particular ones required to run the mainframe? How recently have you seen one? Did they also include five-inch floppies produced by Kyiv’s Electron Mass Factor? he haven’t, especially not in a carefully designed casing that would be camouflaged in an urban battle zone.
Because the mainframe has built-in modules, its two modules can each accommodate a different processing board. The power delivery subsystem for each module was present, and the modules’ cards could be coupled to access different processing options.
The beautifully pieced-together mainframe Chornobyl Family retrieved had five processor boards installed in its seven accessible slots, including two RAM boards, a board for COMs, a board with a four-trigger mouse controller, and one board each with an Intel 8086 clone CPU and a graphics processor. The largest RAM board has a storage capacity of 512 kilobytes, while the smallest one has 128 kilobytes. That’s around the maximum amount of data you can have for a website icon with current compression techniques. It seems as though that is the only image your phone can store in memory.
The cabling and communications systems (COM) ports that allowed the various components of PCs from the 1980s to communicate with one another presented some challenges in the recovery of legacy technology. Missing COM wires would necessitate the reverse engineering of a full hardware and communications design system due to how specialised the drivers and electrical design of the era are. There is some documentation, but you can see how difficult it would be.
Fortunately, attaching a 12-inch Cathode-Ray Tube (CRT) monitor wasn’t necessary because graphical output was provided by the Electronica MS-6105, a copy of Western technology. The workstation’s graphics card was capable of 16-bit colour precision rendering.
The interface of the patched-together PC is remarkable as soon as it starts up: it is a two-tone of black and the overly bright yellow of a fluorescent balloon. As the glowing, yellow interface changes on the screen, reality cries. In Slovakia, which borders the contemporary Exclusion Zone of Ukraine, a reconstructed computer from a previous and current Exclusion Zone starts up.
However, something about electronics is peculiar. also DOS. and studying the past. The ever-familiar yellow-chrome pie chart that is being drawn before our eyes slowly clears the air and functions even in yellow lighting. link here
