00100	                     COMPUTER SCIENCE DEPARTMENT
00200	                         STANFORD UNIVERSITY
00300	                     Stanford, California 94305
00400	
00500	                                                        June 12, 1972

00600	
00700	
00800	
00900	Defense Supply Service - Washington
01000	Room 1D - 245
01100	The Pentagon
01200	Washington, D.C. 20310
01300	
01400	
01500	Attention: Mr. Eugene Stubbs, Contracting Officer
01600	
01700	Subject: Central Processor Procurement (SD-183 Capital Equipment)
01800	
01900	
02000	Gentlemen:
02100	
02200	We request permission to  procure  a  KI-10  Central  Processor  from
02300	Digital Equipment Corporation.  We would trade in our KA-10 processor
02400	and pay a balance of $150,000.  The University is financially  unable
02500	to  provide funds from its own resources to buy this equipment, so we
02600	request that contractual funds be authorized for this purpose.  There
02700	are  sufficient  funds  under the existing contract (SD-183) to cover
02800	this cost.
02900	
03000	Our  PDP-10  computer  facility supports a research community of over
03100	100 full-time programmers plus a number  of  part-time  users.   They
03200	access  the machine through a dozen teletype terminals and 60 display
03300	terminals.  The computer is up about 23 hours per day, 7 days a week,
03400	and  is  nearly  always  heavily loaded.  Daytime loads of 35 or more
03500	online users are typical and there are often as  many  as  25  on  at
03600	midnight.   As  a  result,  service is often  slow and those research
03700	projects that make heavy demands on the machine are often impeded.
03800	
03900	We are getting excellent performance from the system, considering the
04000	equipment and the load.  A CPU utilization of 85%  is  typical  under
04100	full  load.   We  are  in  good  shape with respect to core memory (a
04200	quarter million words), the swapping  store  (20  million  bit/second
04300	transfer rate) and file storage (IBM 3330 disk file with 4 spindles).
04400	The only feasible way to improve system performance appears to be  to
04500	improve CPU performance.
04600	
04700	It was with this fact in mind that we initiated the project to  build
04800	a  high  speed  processor,  with  ARPA  support.  Unfortunately, this
04900	development project is now  making  even  heavier  demands  upon  our
05000	existing facility, and will probably do so for at least a year more.
05100	
05200	
05300	
05400	We had tentatively planned to purchase a paging box  from  BBN  at  a
05500	cost of $66,000 and convert to their TENEX timesharing system.  While
05600	this would provide a wider range  of  user  services,  it  would  not
05700	appear  to  solve our performance problem.  For an additional $84,000
05800	we can get the KI-10, which doubles our processor speed and  provides
05900	a paging box that can later be adapted to TENEX.
06000	
06100	Digital Equipment Corporation promises one month delivery if  we  act
06200	soon.  Under the circumstances, this appears to be the best choice.
06300	
06400	By a copy of this letter, I am requesting Mr. Jack Ducey  of  ONR  to
06500	check on availability, using the enclosed forms DD1419.
06600	
06700	
06800	Very truly yours,
06900	
07000	
07100	
07200	Lester D. Earnest
07300	Executive Officer
07400	
07500	
07600	cc: J. Ducey, ONR (with forms DD1419)
07700	    A. Blue, S. Crocker, L. Roberts, ARPA
07800