The U.S. company SWTPC started in 1964 as DEMCO (Daniel E. Meyer Company). It was incorporated in 1967 as Southwest Technical Products Corporation of San Antonio, Texas. Image:Swtpclgo. ... Motto: (Out Of Many, One) (traditional) In God We Trust (1956 to date) Anthem: The Star-Spangled Banner Capital Washington D.C. Largest city New York City None at federal level (English de facto) Government Federal constitutional republic  - President George Walker Bush (R)  - Vice President Dick Cheney (R) Independence from... 1964 (MCMLXIV) was a leap year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1964 calendar). ... Nickname: Location in the state of Texas Coordinates: , Counties Bexar County Government  - Mayor Phil Hardberger Area  - City  412. ...

In the 1960s, many hobbyist electronics magazines such as Popular Electronics and Radio Electronics published construction articles, for many of which the author would arrange for a company to assemble a kit of parts to build the project. Daniel Meyer published several popular projects and successfully sold his kits. He soon started sell kits for other authors such as Don Lancaster and Louis Garner. Between 1967 and 1971 SWTPC sold kits for over 50 Popular Electronics articles. Most of these kits were intended for audio use, such as hi-fi, utility amplifiers, and test equipment. The cover of the premier issue of Popular Electronics magazine Popular Electronics was started by Ziff-Davis in October 1954. ... Radio electronics is the sub-field of electrical engineering concerning itself with the class of electronic circuits which receive or transmit radio signals. ... Daniel Meyer (b. ... Don Lancaster is an author, inventor, and microcomputer pioneer, best known for his magazine columns. ... High Fidelity is also the title of a book by Nick Hornby and a film directed by Stephen Frears, based upon Hornbys book. ... Generally, an amplifier is any device that uses a small amount of energy to control a larger amount of energy. ...

In 1972 SWTPC had a large enough collections of kits it printed a 32 page catalog. In January 1975 SWTPC introduced a computer terminal kit, the "TV Typewriter", or CT-1024. By November of 1975 they were delivering complete computer kits based on Motorola MPUs. They were very successful for the next 5 or so years and grew to over 100 people. Most of the companies that were selling a computer kit in 1975 were out of business by 1978. Around 1987, SWTPC moved to point of sale computer systems. The original company was terminated about 1990 and became Point Systems. This new company lasted only a few years. The TV Typewriter (TVT) was an early computer kit, introduced by Don Lancaster in 1973. ... POS must not be confused with EFT/POS and POS Terminal used in Electronic payment POS or PoS is an acronym for point-of-sale (or point of purchase). ...

Microcomputer pioneers

When microprocessors (CPU chips) became available, SWTPC became one of the first suppliers of microcomputers to the general public, focusing on designs using the Motorola 6800 and, later, the 6809 CPUs. Many of these products were available in kit form as well. SWTPC also designed and supplied computer terminals, chassis, processor cards, memory cards, motherboards, I/O cards, disk drive systems, and tape storage systems. From the older "TV Typewriter" design a Video terminal had evolved the CT-64 terminal system, which was an essential part of many early SWTPC systems. Later a more intelligent version of this terminal, the CT-82, was introduced, and a graphical terminal the GT-6144 Graphics Terminal. Still later a SS-50 bus plug-in board, the "Data Systems 68 6845 Video Display Board" was introduced, and a keyboard could be connected to this board. With this solution an external terminal was no longer needed. A microprocessor is a programmable digital electronic component that incorporates the functions of a central processing unit (CPU) on a single semiconducting integrated circuit (IC). ... Die of an Intel 80486DX2 microprocessor (actual size: 12×6. ... Integrated circuit of Atmel Diopsis 740 System on Chip showing memory blocks, logic and input/output pads around the periphery Microchips with a transparent window, showing the integrated circuit inside. ... The Commodore 64 was one of the most popular microcomputers of its era, and is the best selling home computer of all time. ... Motorola 6800 Microprocessor The 6800 is a microprocessor produced by Motorola and released shortly after the Intel 8080 in 1975. ... 1 MHz Motorola 6809E processor, manufactured in 1983. ... Motorola 6845 CRT controller The Motorola 6845 (commonly MC6845) is a video address generator first introduced by Motorola and used in the MDA, CGA and EGA video adapters, Amstrad CPC and BBC Micro. ... A Video Display Controller or VDC is an integrated circuit which is the main component in a video signal generator, a device responsible for the production of a TV video signal in a computing or game system. ...

SWTPC's SS-50 backplane bus was supported by several other manufacturers: (Midwest Scientific Inc, Smoke Signal Broadcasting, Gimix, Helix, Tano, Percom Data), etc, It was extended to the SS-64 (for the 68000 CPU) by Helix. SWTPC also designed one of the first affordable printers available for microcomputer users; it was based on a receipt printer mechanism. The SS-50 bus was an early computer bus designed as a part of the SWTPC 6800 Computer System that used the Motorola 6800CPU. The SS-50 motherboard would have around seven 50-pin connectors for CPU and memory boards plus eight 30-pin connectors for I/O boards. ... A backplane is a circuit board (usually a printed circuit board) that connects several connectors in parallel to each other, so that each pin of each connector is linked to the same relative pin of all the other connectors, forming a computer bus. ... In computer architecture, a bus is a subsystem that transfers data or power between computer components inside a computer or between computers and typically is controlled by device driver software. ...

Technical Systems Consultants, first of West Lafayette, Indiana (ex Purdue University) and later of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, was the foremost supplier of software for SWTPC compatible hardware. Their software included operating systems (Flex, mini-FLEX, FLEX09, and UniFLEX) and various languages (several BASIC variants, FORTRAN, Pascal, C, assemblers, etc) and other applications. Other software, from third parties, included Introl's C compiler, Omegasoft's Pascal compiler, the Lucidata Pascal system (from Cambridge, UK), and assorted spread sheets and text processors. By about 1980, TSC had developed a Unix-like multi-user, multi-programming operating system (UniFLEX), for 6809 systems with DMA 8" floppy disks and extended memory. Several of TSC's languages were ported to the uniFlex, as was the Lucidata Pascal system. This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... The FLEX operating system was developed by the company TSC for the Motorola 6800 in the 1970s. ... C is a general-purpose, block structured, procedural, imperative computer programming language developed in 1972 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories for use with the Unix operating system. ... A diagram of the operation of a typical multi-language, multi-target compiler. ... Pascal is an imperative computer programming language, developed in 1970 by Niklaus Wirth as a language particularly suitable for structured programming. ...

SWTPC was a pioneer of open source software. Their software catalog included the TSC software, and software from many other sources (including SWTPC itself). Much of it was available in source code -- for a higher cost. Open source refers to projects that are open to the public and which draw on other projects that are freely available to the general public. ...

Product gallery

Click the images to enlarge.

Universal Strobe (1968) Image File history File links Metadata No higher resolution available. ... U-shaped Xenon Flash Lamp A xenon flash lamp is a gas discharge lamp designed to produce extremely intense, incoherent, full-spectrum white light for very short durations. ...	Stereo preamplifier (1969) Image File history File linksMetadata SWTPC_PreAmp. ... An example of a typical high-end stereo preamplifier. ...	Digital Measurements Lab, Frequency Counter Module (1970) Image File history File links Metadata No higher resolution available. ... A frequency counter is an electronic instrument, or component of one, that is used for measuring frequency. ...	Function Generator (1973) Image File history File links Metadata Size of this preview: 655 × 599 pixelsFull resolution (800 × 732 pixel, file size: 92 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) SWTPC Function Generator kit. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with signal generator. ...
CT-1024 Terminal with monitor (January 1975) Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (900x586, 74 KB) Summary SWTPC CT-1024 Computer Terminal. ...	CT-1024 Terminal System (January 1975) Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (956x768, 111 KB) Summary SWTPC CT-1024 Computer Terminal. ...	SWTPC 6800 microcomputer system (November 1975) Image File history File linksMetadata SWTPC6800_Computer. ...	SWTPC 6800 microcomputer system (November 1975) Image File history File links Download high resolution version (2094x1398, 293 KB) Work by Rama File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects are not listed): SWTPC ...
SWTPC 6800 microcomputer system (November 1975) Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (938x713, 107 KB) Summary SWTPC 6800 Computer System Photo by Michael Holley (2005) Licensing File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file, (del) = delete this old version, (rev) = revert to this old version. ...	SWTPC AC-30 Cassette Interface (July 1976) Image File history File linksMetadata SWTPC_AC30_Cassette_Interface. ...

External links

• SWTPC product history website – By Bill Dawson and Michael Holley
• Collection of old analog and digital computers at www.oldcomputermuseum.com