Reading MT/ST Tapes

Chuck Guzis cclist at sydex.com
Fri Jul 30 18:21:21 CDT 2021


On 7/30/21 3:56 PM, Cory Heisterkamp via cctalk wrote:

> With all of the pet projects documented on the net (ranging from the esoteric to the absurd) it’s interesting that no one has tackled this one yet. -C

Not really--it's very old technology, (1964), of limited capacity (about
20 KB per tape), was a hideously expensive way to buy a typewriter
(about USD$7000 in 1964, or about USD$61,000 today), used almost
exclusively in large corporate offices to create form letters and
documents.  In other words, it was not intended as an archival medium.

The effort required in preparing a document was considerable (one used
the mini-keypad for various functions).  For a memo, it was easiest to
use the typewriter as a typewriter.

There are more interesting things to look at.

--Chuck


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