At present, if you’d like a pc for a specific process, you buy groceries. However within the early days of computing, unique functions wanted customized computer systems. What’s extra is that with the expense of computer systems, you seemingly bought one made that match precisely what you wanted and no extra. That led to many oddball one-off or practically one-off computer systems throughout that time-frame. Identical for peripheral units — you constructed what you needed to and also you left the remaining on the drafting desk. [Vintage Geek] bought his arms on what seems to be considered one of them: the Gerber Scientific 6200.
Whereas Gerber Scientific remains to be round, we’ve by no means heard of the 6200. Based mostly on the serial quantity, we might guess no less than 62 of them have been made and this one has an fascinating backstory of residing in somebody’s residence who labored on the Pentagon. We presume the tapes have been erased earlier than it was bought!
Design-wise, it’s fairly commonplace stuff. A 19-inch rack, an ordinary tape drive from Kennedy, an influence provide, and a few playing cards. The field takes 240 V, so the pc didn’t get powered up, however an examination of the within seemed like this actually was a one-off with handwritten labels on masking tape.
We couldn’t inform for positive if the machine was a pc itself, or only a tape drive and perhaps plotter interface for an additional laptop. If you recognize something about this machine, we’re positive [Vintage Geek] wish to hear from you.
If this does prove to have a CPU onboard, we’d wager it’s bit sliced. If in case you have a 9-track tape machine, you will have to make your personal tapes quickly.
RelatedPosts
