Reproducing old machines with newer technology (Re: PDP-12 at the RICM)

[Jay Jaeger]

Yes, the S/360 had packed decimal - but much more limited in length, and
no wordmark concept.

The 7070 and 7080 were contemporary with the 1410, not after it.  They
did not follow it.  While data representations were somewhat similar,
the instruction formats were very different.

he 7080 (which apparently fixed a 7070 design which made it an orphan
pretty quick) was announced in January 1960, and the 1410 in October of
that same year.   What 7070 and 7080 actually followed were the 705 and
650.  They were also different from the 1401/1410 in that they used
fixed length instructions, rather than the variable instructions used by
the 1401/1410.

https://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/dpd50/dpd50_chronology2.html

In the 7000 series, the 1410 equivalent was the 7010 - architecturally
compatible, ran the same software, but implemented in 7000 series
technology.  It came along in 1962.  So that was really the last one to
be introduced of its ilk.

Other than clones and the like (e.g., from folks like Honeywell), I'm
not aware of any other machines with a similar architecture to the 1401
and 1410.  Name them?

By 1968 the System/360 had essentially toasted them all.

JRU

On 7/14/2015 10:10 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
> On 07/14/2015 06:55 PM, Jay Jaeger wrote:
> 
>> Architecturally, it was pretty much the last of its kind: the last of
>> the BCD decimal arithmetic machines, which also makes it interesting.
>> It has also become much more obscure than the 1401, which it followed,
>> because not nearly as many were made and sold.
> 
> Not by a long shot, it was followed by the 7000-series machines, namely
> the 7070 and 7080 (I have a soft spot for the 1620 myself) and
> ultimately variable length BCD was included in the S/360 and later series.
> 
> Having programmed 1401s, I'll grant that the architecture was pretty
> different from what we're used to today, but typical for a small machine
> of the time.
> 
> --Chuck
> 
>