In the UK at that sort of time you were presumably
required to have a GPO
(later BT) modem and nothing else, but I'm afraid the web seems to be rather
I beleive so, since everything connected to the phone line had to be
rented from the GPO.
I can't help with dates, but I do have a few old ex-GPO modems in the
collection.
The Modem 2B is a large box (about 16" square and 7" high from memory.
It's 300 baud, original and answer. The front panel opens by undoing 2
captice screws at the bottom and then hinging it up (there's a little
'stay' to keep it open). Insider are 4 plug-in modules -- PSU,
Demodulator, Control, Modulator, with testpoints, fuses, and adjustments
on the front panels.
The modulator appears to be a VCO with switched control voltage. The
demodulator has 'tobacco tins' which cotnain complex LC filter networks,
and appears to work by mixingthe incoming signal with a lcoal oscillator,
extracting the 'sum' frequency, and feeding that to a discrimiator
circuit (similar to one of the standard ones used in FM radio receivers,
I forget which). It's all discrete transistors and relays (in the control
module), no ICs.
The Modem D1200A is similar in construction and design (and seems to be
the same case) but is 1200/75 baud (I forget which way round, it may well
be the 'host' end of a Prestel link).
The Modem 13A is somewhat later. It's a plinth that's screwed to the
bottom of a type 746 telephone (one of the standard desk telephones of
the 1970s). the phone has buttons to select voice or 'data' in front of
the handset rest. The circuitry seems to use several metal-can (10 or 12
lead TO5-like cans) ICs that I know nothing about, and alas the schematic
diagram inside the phone just shows the wiring to the extra switches and
to the modem unit, no details of the internal circuitry of the modem
itself. Again it seems to be 300 baud, probably originate only.
-tony