Processor Technology
Encyclopedia
Microcomputer
A microcomputer is a computer with a microprocessor as its central processing unit. They are physically small compared to mainframe and minicomputers...
company founded by Bob Marsh and Gary Ingram in April 1975. Its best known product is the Sol-20 computer.
History
Bob Marsh, Lee FelsensteinLee Felsenstein
Lee Felsenstein is an American computer engineer who played a central role in the development of the personal computer...
and Gordon French started designing the Sol-20 between April and July of 1975. The Sol-20 utilized the Intel 8080
Intel 8080
The Intel 8080 was the second 8-bit microprocessor designed and manufactured by Intel and was released in April 1974. It was an extended and enhanced variant of the earlier 8008 design, although without binary compatibility...
8-bit microprocessor
Microprocessor
A microprocessor incorporates the functions of a computer's central processing unit on a single integrated circuit, or at most a few integrated circuits. It is a multipurpose, programmable device that accepts digital data as input, processes it according to instructions stored in its memory, and...
chip, running at 2 MHz. A major difference between the Sol-20 and most other machines of the era was its built-in video driver, which allowed it to be attached to a composite monitor
Composite monitor
A composite monitor is any analog video display that receives input in the form of an analog composite video signal through a single cable — in contrast to multiple-cable or multiple-wire video sources such as VGA cable...
for display. The Sol-20 consisted of a main motherboard
Printed circuit board
A printed circuit board, or PCB, is used to mechanically support and electrically connect electronic components using conductive pathways, tracks or signal traces etched from copper sheets laminated onto a non-conductive substrate. It is also referred to as printed wiring board or etched wiring...
(PCB) mounted at the bottom of the case, and a five slot S-100 bus
S-100 bus
The S-100 bus or Altair bus, IEEE696-1983 , was an early computer bus designed in 1974 as a part of the Altair 8800, generally considered today to be the first personal computer...
card cage. The main PCB consisted of the CPU, memory, video display, I/O circuits. Inside the case included power supply, fan, and keyboard. The case was painted 'IBM blue' and the sides of case were made of solid oiled walnut
Walnut
Juglans is a plant genus of the family Juglandaceae, the seeds of which are known as walnuts. They are deciduous trees, 10–40 meters tall , with pinnate leaves 200–900 millimetres long , with 5–25 leaflets; the shoots have chambered pith, a character shared with the wingnuts , but not the hickories...
salvaged from a gun stock manufacturer.
Processor Technology manufactured approximately 10,000 Sol-20 personal computers between 1977 and 1979. All Processor Technology products were available either fully assembled, or as electronic kits
Electronic kits
An electronic kit is a package of electrical components used to build an electronic device. Generally, kits are composed of electronic components, a circuit diagram , assembly instructions and often a printed circuit board or another type of prototyping board.There are 2 distinct types of kit,...
. Processor Technology also sold software on Cassette tape. One side of the tape was recorded in CUTS format, and the other side was Kansas City standard
Kansas City standard
The Kansas City Standard , or Byte standard, is a digital data format for audio cassette drives. Byte magazine sponsored a symposium in November 1975 in Kansas City, Missouri to develop a standard for storage of digital computer data on inexpensive consumer quality cassettes, at a time when...
format. Gary Ingram and Steven Dompier wrote the original software utilities. Lee Felsenstein
Lee Felsenstein
Lee Felsenstein is an American computer engineer who played a central role in the development of the personal computer...
wrote the original user manuals as a contractor.
Making Standards
Processor Technology also designed several S-100 busS-100 bus
The S-100 bus or Altair bus, IEEE696-1983 , was an early computer bus designed in 1974 as a part of the Altair 8800, generally considered today to be the first personal computer...
boards. The boards were meant to be compatible with the circuits of Sol-20.
Most notable was the VDM-1. The Video Display Module 1 was the original video display interface for S-100 bus systems,. The board generates sixteen 64-character lines of upper and lower case typeface on any standard composite video
Composite video
Composite video is the format of an analog television signal before it is combined with a sound signal and modulated onto an RF carrier. In contrast to component video it contains all required video information, including colors in a single line-level signal...
monitor or a modified TV set. Utilizing a 1,024 byte (1K) segment of system memory, the VDM-1 provided memory-mapped I/O
Memory-mapped I/O
Memory-mapped I/O and port I/O are two complementary methods of performing input/output between the CPU and peripheral devices in a computer...
for high performance, and also included hardware support for scrolling. The VDM-1 Video Board was a great improvement over using a teletype machine or a serial attached terminals, and was popular for owners of other S-100 bus systems such as the IMSAI 8080
IMSAI 8080
The IMSAI 8080 was an early microcomputer released in late 1975, based on the Intel 8080 and later 8085 and S-100 bus. It was a clone of its main competitor, the earlier MITS Altair 8800. The IMSAI is largely regarded as the first "clone" computer. The IMSAI machine ran a highly modified version of...
.
Another popular product was the CUTS Tape I/O Interface S-100 board. The CUTS board offered standard interface for saving and reading data from cassette tape, supporting both the Kansas City Standard
Kansas City standard
The Kansas City Standard , or Byte standard, is a digital data format for audio cassette drives. Byte magazine sponsored a symposium in November 1975 in Kansas City, Missouri to develop a standard for storage of digital computer data on inexpensive consumer quality cassettes, at a time when...
format, as well as their own custom CUTS format. Lee Felsenstein was key participant of the development of Kansas City Standard format, the first cross-system data transfer standard for microcomputers.
Products
- Computers
- SOL-20 — available as fully assembled or as kit form
- S-100 bus boards
- VDM-1 — Video Display Module Board
- 3P+S — Input/Output Module 3 Parallel plus 1 Serial Board
- 4KRA — 4K Static Memory Board
- 8KRA — 8K Static Memory Board
- 16KRA — 16K DRAM memory board
- 32KRA-1 — 32K DRAM memory board
- CUTS — Tape I/O Interface Board, CUTS format and Kansas City standardKansas City standardThe Kansas City Standard , or Byte standard, is a digital data format for audio cassette drives. Byte magazine sponsored a symposium in November 1975 in Kansas City, Missouri to develop a standard for storage of digital computer data on inexpensive consumer quality cassettes, at a time when...
format - 2KRO — EPROM memory board
- Software
- SOLOS — Operating System
- CUTER — Monitor program and cassette tape loader.
- ASSM — 8080 Assembler
- BASIC/5 — 5K BASIC programming language
- Extended Cassette Basic (8K) — BASIC Interpreter
- ALS-8
- EDIT — 8080 Editor
- 8080 Chess — Chess Game
- TREK-80Trek-80-Plot:The object of Trek-80 is to destroy all the Klingon vessels while losing no more than five supply tugs in a specified period of time. The player moves the ship using warp drive for galactic travel, and impulse drive for inner quadrant movement. The Enterprise and Klingon vessels are armed...
— Star Trek Themed Game - GamePack 1 — Collection of Games - Volume 1
- GamePack 2 — Collection of Games - Volume 2