200 BEGINNING OF THE MINICOMPUTER
Figure 29 and Table 2 present the power requirements, weight, and volume of the 12-bit machines. In general, the power requirements have remained relatively constant. This is both because each package must house a fixed number of devices and because each device has a relatively high overhead power cost associated with driving the Omnibus. However, the limited configuration, lack of an Omnibus, and low power requirements of CMOS make the VT78 an exception to this rule. The weight and volume have declined significantly with time as the design has moved from two cabinets to a half cabinet, and then from a half cabinet to being embedded in a terminal.
SPECIAL DEVICES BASED ON THE PDP-8
The PDP-8/A and the products which incorporate the CMOS-8 chip are the current 12- bit product offerings, so the discussion of the
(b) Weight versus time.
(c) Volume versus time.
Figure 29. Power, weight, and volume for DEC's 12-bit computers versus time.