30-year-old computer still runs HVAC system for 19 public schools

[Mixolydian]

http://www.popularmechanics.com/tec...a16010/30-year-old-computer-runs-school-heat/

See, just because it's old doesn't mean it's useless or inferior!

Pretty cool, really.

 

[UglyCasanova]

$2 million to replace it? Really?

 

[BUTCH1]

Actually somewhat misleading as the reporter asks the maintenance supervisor what he would do if it quit working and he replied, "we look to Ebay which is where this one came from"..so it seems it was replaced at one point with a used unit. Still pretty cool I agree, I'm thinking that they can't just shove a $200 Dell in there because the software was probably custom written just for the Amiga.
EDIT:, I was kinda wrong, right at the end the reporter said the use of Ebay was for those "hard to find parts" so probably disk drives, mouse and things like that have been replaced over the years.

 

[lxskllr]

$2 million to replace it? Really?

Probably uses proprietary software, so no one knows how the hell it works. Otherwise, it should be easy to port over some other system; like Android or RaspberryPi.

 

[KeithP]

If the computer stopped working tomorrow, a staff person would have to turn each building’s climate control systems on and off by hand.

Well, we certainly can't have that. $2 million well spent.

-KeithP

 

[IndyColtsFan]

Article is misleading:

1. As mentioned earlier, the guy said they got parts on eBay and said "That's where this one came from."
2. That's an Amiga 2000, which was released in 1987. Not quite 30 years.

Commodore went under in 1994 and these guys were idiots not to start planning the replacement at that time. I love those machines but it was time to replace them for critical stuff long ago.

Actually somewhat misleading as the reporter asks the maintenance supervisor what he would do if it quit working and he replied, "we look to Ebay which is where this one came from"..so it seems it was replaced at one point with a used unit. Still pretty cool I agree, I'm thinking that they can't just shove a $200 Dell in there because the software was probably custom written just for the Amiga.
EDIT:, I was kinda wrong, right at the end the reporter said the use of Ebay was for those "hard to find parts" so probably disk drives, mouse and things like that have been replaced over the years.

eBay and Amibay are huge resources for Amiga fans. I upgraded my old Amiga 2000 a few years ago by buying parts off eBay and Amibay. What used to cost thousands (meaning I couldn't afford them in the late 80s/90s as a high school and college kid) can now be had for just $100-$200. It is really cool.

 

[Ruptga]

$2 million to replace it? Really?

Well, we certainly can't have that. $2 million well spent.

-KeithP

...and the associated systems - the shortwave radios and whatever other interfaces are involved. A lot of that money would probably go toward removing old bulky equipment and rewiring the HVAC for something that can accept commands over IP.

Read the article people, it's only 5 short paragraphs.

 

[lxskllr]

...and the associated systems - the shortwave radios and whatever other interfaces are involved. A lot of that money would probably go toward removing old bulky equipment and rewiring the HVAC for something that can accept commands over IP.

Read the article people, it's only 5 short paragraphs.

That's still a lot money. They could procure 5 year old Android phones virtually free, and get a computer, networking, and battery backup in one shot. $1m(half the proposed contract) buys a lot of coding time, and modifications.

 

[Ruptga]

That's still a lot money. They could procure 5 year old Android phones virtually free, and get a computer, networking, and battery backup in one shot. $1m(half the proposed contract) buys a lot of coding time, and modifications.

Agreed, but we're talking about 19 schools. That's a lot of buildings, and that also basically guarantees this would be managed by people that know dick about technology, including whoever they have on staff to handle their IT stuff. Their buildings are going to be old and just removing the old shortwave equipment is going to be a real pain. That budget could also easily include upgrades and overhauls of the HVAC systems themselves, but that's just a guess. In any case, I was mainly taking issue with the people that apparently thought this was a two million dollar Amiga.

 

[BUTCH1]

Article is misleading:

1. As mentioned earlier, the guy said they got parts on eBay and said "That's where this one came from."
2. That's an Amiga 2000, which was released in 1987. Not quite 30 years.

Commodore went under in 1994 and these guys were idiots not to start planning the replacement at that time. I love those machines but it was time to replace them for critical stuff long ago.



eBay and Amibay are huge resources for Amiga fans. I upgraded my old Amiga 2000 a few years ago by buying parts off eBay and Amibay. What used to cost thousands (meaning I couldn't afford them in the late 80s/90s as a high school and college kid) can now be had for just $100-$200. It is really cool.

Yea, I'm still dumbfounded as to how/why Commodore went bankrupt, the 64 alone was a HUGE success and sold between 10-17 million units and this form Wiki, "The C64 made an impressive debut at the January 1982 Consumer Electronics Show, as recalled by Production Engineer David A. Ziembicki: "All we saw at our booth were Atari people with their mouths dropping open, saying, 'How can you do that for $595?'" The answer was vertical integration; due to Commodore's ownership of MOS Technology's semiconductor fabrication facilities, each C64 had an estimated production cost of US$135."

 

[jlee]

That's still a lot money. They could procure 5 year old Android phones virtually free, and get a computer, networking, and battery backup in one shot. $1m(half the proposed contract) buys a lot of coding time, and modifications.

That sounds like an absolute nightmare to support.

 

[BUTCH1]

That sounds like an absolute nightmare to support.

Yup, and if one of the phones dies or a cell tower is hit by lightning down goes your system. They would be better off still using RF.

 

[Red Squirrel]

This is why I hate proprietary software. You'd be surprised how common this is in places like hospitals. Lot of times the company that makes the software/system is long gone too so there is no upgrade path or support. Lots of NT4 stuff at our hospital because the company that makes the software no longer exists but it's super critical and there's no alternative software or there is no way to migrate the data over because it's so proprietary.

On the other hand there are systems like DMS telephony switches that have been running for decades and still perform their function and also still have support, so they just have no reason to change it. Our switch has an uptime of like 30 years, I'm sure there are systems out there that have an even bigger up time.

In this case it's literally just a relay controller / sensor reader. A Raspberry Pi or similar computer or PLC and about $10,000 in parts could replace it. I'm being very generous in the 10k figure, but I'm thinking, nema cabinets, din rails, din relays etc... that stuff cost a bit more. Easier to support too. Any hvac tech should be able to understand and implement such a system.

 

[lxskllr]

That sounds like an absolute nightmare to support.

Why's that? You buy 1900 identical phones @ $10 each(100 phones per school), and get a system that'll last virtually forever, with $998,000,100 left for coding, and interface changes to the system. Let's be honest here; that Amiga is working as a glorified switch. Most of the people on this forum have more sophisticated HVAC in their houses. Just because it's "only a phone" doesn't invalidate its use as a workhorse computer. It absolutely trounces the Amiga in every measureable aspect, and is inexpensive, with a large knowledeable base for support.

 

[BUTCH1]

Why's that? You buy 1900 identical phones @ $10 each(100 phones per school), and get a system that'll last virtually forever, with $998,000,100 left for coding, and interface changes to the system. Let's be honest here; that Amiga is working as a glorified switch. Most of the people on this forum have more sophisticated HVAC in their houses. Just because it's "only a phone" doesn't invalidate its use as a workhorse computer. It absolutely trounces the Amiga in every measureable aspect, and is inexpensive, with a large knowledeable base for support.

All true, but someone still has to write the code to control the system and I highly doubt that any single home is "more sophisticated" than maintaining 19 separate buildings with many of them probably having different design/age systems in place.

 

[ImpulsE69]

I'm curious if this has saved them a considerable amount of money over the years and if so how much. Also...why do they need a computer to remotely control 19 schools temps?

 

[drebo]

That's still a lot money. They could procure 5 year old Android phones virtually free, and get a computer, networking, and battery backup in one shot. $1m(half the proposed contract) buys a lot of coding time, and modifications.

They already have an IP network between the sites.

The $2m is to replace the HVAC systems as a whole in 19 schools. Probably with heat pumps and more efficient furnaces. That's like $100k per school. That's not that expensive.

 

[drebo]

This is why I hate proprietary software. You'd be surprised how common this is in places like hospitals. Lot of times the company that makes the software/system is long gone too so there is no upgrade path or support. Lots of NT4 stuff at our hospital because the company that makes the software no longer exists but it's super critical and there's no alternative software or there is no way to migrate the data over because it's so proprietary.

On the other hand there are systems like DMS telephony switches that have been running for decades and still perform their function and also still have support, so they just have no reason to change it. Our switch has an uptime of like 30 years, I'm sure there are systems out there that have an even bigger up time.

In this case it's literally just a relay controller / sensor reader. A Raspberry Pi or similar computer or PLC and about $10,000 in parts could replace it. I'm being very generous in the 10k figure, but I'm thinking, nema cabinets, din rails, din relays etc... that stuff cost a bit more. Easier to support too. Any hvac tech should be able to understand and implement such a system.

They're replacing the whole system, not just the controls.

 

[sdifox]

They never tried an Amiga emulator?

 

[Zodiark1593]

I call this situation Pandora's Box. No one knows it's inner workings. No one knows when or how it works or how it will fail. All they know is it's been running for near three decades straight. Once it has been opened, there is no closing it. Anyone want the responsibility of opening Pandora's Box?

 

[Red Squirrel]

They're replacing the whole system, not just the controls.

Oh then that price is not too bad then, for that many schools. They just put in a system here at work for the main floor equipment rooms and I think it was a couple 100k. The controls part is literally a laptop sitting on a shelf connected to the nema cabinet.

 

[lxskllr]

They already have an IP network between the sites.

The $2m is to replace the HVAC systems as a whole in 19 schools. Probably with heat pumps and more efficient furnaces. That's like $100k per school. That's not that expensive.

I interpreted it as only the control system being replaced, but that makes more sense. It's always hard to tell when dealing with the government. They can find some spectacular ways of spending money. It's easy when it's "free".

 

[Harrod]

At the cost of replacing that unit, I would probably buy up a few extra whole systems worth of parts for that day when it craps out. I can't tell you how much stuff that the company I work for has deployed that we know is subject to crapping out randomly and creating outages and all spares are 2 states away sometimes. This is old stuff where the company has went out of business and there are very few spare parts on ebay.

 

[styrafoam]

http://woodtv.com/2015/06/11/1980s-computer-controls-grps-heat-and-ac/

This local to the schools article fills in a few details--

 

[drebo]

I interpreted it as only the control system being replaced, but that makes more sense. It's always hard to tell when dealing with the government. They can find some spectacular ways of spending money. It's easy when it's "free".

Thing is that there are a number of new "regulations" that have come out in a lot of places that specify things like "if the outside temp is lower than the inside temp, you're not allowed to run an air conditioner" but a 30+ year old system can't conform to that, so they have to replace those older systems with newer ones capable of sensing that and turning on the appropriate mode (heat pump vs air conditioner, etc).

In all, over the life of the systems, opex savings will eat significantly into that $2m capex due to electricity savings.

What I find interesting, though, is the district needs a $180m bond to be able to work this in to their maintenance budget. That's kind of wack, honestly.