I have a seen a lot of systems where the interface is some ancient text-based thing running in a virtual machine on a random modern(ish) PC. I guess the funny thing here is that they even included a static photo of the physical device framing the emulated display so it would be more obviously a continuation. Maybe that’s just a function of whatever emulator they adapted, but it’s interesting.
I’ve seen an electronics assembly line where some board testers were made for various operating systems such as DOS, Windows 3.11, Windows 95, W98, W2000 and XP. Yes, they still had examples of each of these in production use. Due to security concerns, they just had to make a dedicated isolated network that allowed the testers to still save the results somewhere.
Some tester hardware required the LPT port, and they had some issues finding computers that still had one. Sure, you can use a USB adapter, but some testers just didn’t work correctly when the signal had to go through an adapter, so they literally had no choice but to use an authentic ancient computer built in the LPT era.
When you open that door, you may also need to use one of those ancient 1GB hard disks because the motherboard didn’t have any SATA ports. If a computer like that has any issues at all with any hardware parts, you’re usually in big trouble because finding replacement parts is not as easy as it once was. Eventually you have to ask yourself, how much does it cost to rebuild the entire production line out of modern parts and how much does it cost to kick the can down the road.
I have a seen a lot of systems where the interface is some ancient text-based thing running in a virtual machine on a random modern(ish) PC. I guess the funny thing here is that they even included a static photo of the physical device framing the emulated display so it would be more obviously a continuation. Maybe that’s just a function of whatever emulator they adapted, but it’s interesting.
I’ve seen an electronics assembly line where some board testers were made for various operating systems such as DOS, Windows 3.11, Windows 95, W98, W2000 and XP. Yes, they still had examples of each of these in production use. Due to security concerns, they just had to make a dedicated isolated network that allowed the testers to still save the results somewhere.
Some tester hardware required the LPT port, and they had some issues finding computers that still had one. Sure, you can use a USB adapter, but some testers just didn’t work correctly when the signal had to go through an adapter, so they literally had no choice but to use an authentic ancient computer built in the LPT era.
When you open that door, you may also need to use one of those ancient 1GB hard disks because the motherboard didn’t have any SATA ports. If a computer like that has any issues at all with any hardware parts, you’re usually in big trouble because finding replacement parts is not as easy as it once was. Eventually you have to ask yourself, how much does it cost to rebuild the entire production line out of modern parts and how much does it cost to kick the can down the road.