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by jbgreer
1079 days ago
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I have a small connection to an early part of this story. In 1982/3 I worked for a local data processing / software consultancy / hardware reseller doing a variety of odd jobs. One day the owner came in and said they were going to become a reseller of a new computer, a Victor Technologies machine, as computers and terminals on IBM System 3X machines via Perle protocol converters. I remapped the keyboard of the Victor to allow the right shift to serve as a 5251 Enter key. Victor had rented space in a new office tower and held a grand opening a couple of weeks later. I demonstrated our wares. There wasn’t that much interest, so I wandered around all of the display booths, learned what they were demoing, and in some cases took over. I remember 3 distinct features:
1) variable speed disk drives, which meant the Victor could store more data than am IBM PC.
2) a built-in codec for recording sound, especially speech, and aiding playback.
3) a stylus/touch-screen monitor option, which could be used for CAD etc. I had an option to buy a machine for half price. I was an Apple IIe guy at the time and couldn’t have afforded it anyway, but it was a sweet machine. Sadly, that didn’t matter much, and Victor went out of business soon enough. |
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