Table of contents

Introduction

CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP products are distributed in form of a zip file that contains the CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP installation executable ("InstallShell.exe"). The InstallShell procedure offers the possibility to select several modules to install. It is recommended to install all modules (the default).

CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP installation consists of the following steps:

• Perform host system checks (hardware and software) to ensure the host platform meets minimum CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP installation requirements

• Optionally, create a specific CHARON username with administrative privileges

• Extract CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP installation procedure files from its archive

• Install CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP by running "InstallShell.exe" installer and following the instructions

• Install CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP license (hardware dongle or software license)

• Configure CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP host system, for example, network adapter, host OS services, etc.

Hardware Requirements

Number of CPU cores

Each CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP emulated CPU requires a corresponding physical core. So the total number of the host CPUs must exceed the number of emulated CPUs since some of the host CPUs must be dedicated to serving CHARON I/O operations and host operating system needs.

The following table shows the minimum and recommended number of CPUs required for VAX/PDP11 models:

When starting, the CHARON-VAX software checks the available number of host CPU cores. Currently, this check is based on the maximum number of VAX CPUs that can be emulated, not on the number of the actually configured VAX CPUs. Therefore the number of host CPU cores recommended for the maximum number of emulated CPUs - as shown in the right column of the table above - must be available. If the available number of host CPU cores is below this number, CHARON-VAX will issue a warning message even if the requirements for the configured number of VAX CPUs are fulfilled. The CHARON-VAX software will work despite this warning if the requirements for the configured number of VAX CPUs are fulfilled.

CPU type and speed

Since CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP utilizes the LAHF instruction during VAX/PDP11 CPU emulation, please avoid using early (pre-2005) AMD64 and Intel 64 CPUs in CHARON host system since they lack this capability. AMD Athlon 64, Opteron and Turion 64 revision D processors from March 2005 and Intel Pentium 4 G1 stepping from December 2005 are LAHF instruction capable.

Concerning CPU speed, the general recommendation is that higher CPU frequency is better since it allows better emulated VAX/PDP11 performance. The minimal recommendation is at least 3 GHz.

Operative memory

The minimum host memory size depends on the amount of VAX/PDP11 memory to be emulated and on the number of CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP instances to be run on one host.
The minimum host memory is calculated according to the following formula:

The minimum host memory = (2Gb +  the amount of VAX/PDP11 memory emulated) per CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP instance.

Only in the case of a 32-bit host OS, when more than 1.5 GB VAX memory is configured, a 32 bit Windows host system must be configured for "large application memory". This is done by adding the /PAE and /3GB switches to the Windows boot.ini file.

To set the /PAE and /3GB startup switch in Windows:

1. Right-click My Computer and select Properties. The System Properties dialog box will appear.

2. Click the "Advanced" tab.

3. In the "Startup and Recovery" area, click "Settings". The "Startup and Recovery" dialog box will appear.

4. In the System startup area, click "Edit". This will open the Windows boot.ini file in Notepad.

5. In the [Operating Systems] section, add the following switches to the end of the startup line that includes the /fastdetect switch: /PAE and /3GB

6. Save the changes and close Notepad.

7. Click OK two times to close the open dialog boxes, and then restart the computer for the change to take effect.

Disk storage

The total amount of disk space required for CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP can be calculated as a sum of all the disk/tape image sizes plus 500 MB for the CHARON software plus space required for the normal host OS.

Ethernet adapters

CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP networking assumes dedicated host Ethernet adapters; their number must be equal to the emulated adapters to be configured in CHARON-VAX / CHARON-PDP11. One adapter (optionally) can be left to the host for TCP/IP networking etc.

Software Requirements

• Microsoft Windows Server 2016 Standard and Datacenter Editions, 64 bit version

• Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 Standard and Datacenter Editions, 64 bit version (please notice that only R2 revision is supported)

• Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise Editions, 32 bit and 64 bit version

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 (SP1)  Standard and Enterprise Editions, 64 bit version (please notice that only R2 revision is supported)

• Microsoft Windows 7 Professional and Ultimate (SP1) Editions, 32 bit and 64 bit versions

• Microsoft Windows 8.1 Professional Edition, 32 and 64 bit versions

• VMware ESXi 5.5 and 6.x up to 6.7 (requires a supported Windows operating system on top of a ESXi virtual machine)

• Microsoft Hyper-V (requires a supported Windows operating system on top of a Hyper-V virtual machine)