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IBM 5100
IBM 5100
The IBM 5100 Portable Computer Manufacturer Type Release date IBM Professional Computer September1975
Introductory price From $8,975 (BASIC with 16KB) to $19,975 (BASIC+APL with 64KB) Discontinued CPU Memory Input Successor 1978 IBM PALM processor clocked at 1.9MHz 16KB to 64KB RAM (with 16KB iterations), 32KB to 64KB ROM Keyboard IBM 5110
The IBM 5100 Portable Computer was a portable computer introduced in September 1975, six years before the IBM PC. It was the evolution of a prototype called the SCAMP (Special Computer APL Machine Portable) that was developed at the IBM Palo Alto Scientific Center in 1973. In January 1978 IBM announced the IBM 5110, its larger cousin, and in February 1980 IBM announced the IBM 5120. The 5100 was withdrawn in March 1982. When the IBM PC was introduced in 1981, it was originally designated as the IBM 5150, putting it in the "5100" series, though its architecture was not directly descended from the IBM 5100.
Description
The IBM 5100 is based on a 16-bit processor module called PALM (Put All Logic in Microcode). The IBM 5100 Maintenance Information Manual also referred to the PALM module as the controller. The PALM could directly address 64 KB of memory. Some configurations of the IBM 5100 had Executable ROS (ROM) and RAM memory totalling more than 64 KB, so a simple bank switching scheme was used. The actual APL and/or BASIC interpreters were stored in a separate Language ROS address space which the PALM treats as a peripheral device. Prices ranged from $11,000 (16k model) to $20,000 (64k).
IBM 5100
Display
The 5100 has an internal CRT (5" diagonal) and displays 16 lines of 64 characters. IBM provided an option switch to allow the user to display all 64 characters of each line, or only the left or right 32 characters (interspersed with spaces). Also there was a switch to display the first 512 bytes of main memory in hexadecimal for diagnostic purposes.
Mass storage
IBM's solution was provided by quarter-inch cartridge (QIC) magnetic tape drives that use standard DC300 cartridges to store 204 Kbytes. One drive was installed in the machine and a second (Model 5106) could be added in an attached box. The data format included several types and were written in 512 byte records.
External monitor
An external video monitor (or modified television receiver) could be connected to the IBM 5100 via a BNC connector on the back panel. While the 5100 had a front panel switch to select between white on black or black on white for the internal display, this switch did not affect the external monitor, which only offered bright characters on a black background. The vertical scan rate was fixed at 60 Hz.
Communications adapter
Also in September 1975 IBM announced the IBM 5100 Communications Adapter, that allowed the 5100 to transmit data to and receive data from a remote system. It made the 5100 appear the same as an IBM 2741 Communications Terminal and was designed to be able to communicate with IBM 2741 compatible machines in start-stop mode using the EBCD (Extended Binary Coded Decimal) notation. EBCD was similar to the more common IBM EBCDIC code, but not identical.
IBM 5100
Different models
Available in 12 models providing 16 KB, 32 KB, 48 KB or 64 KB of main storage, the 5100 sold for between $8,975 and $19,975 (between $38.9thousand and $86.7thousand in today's dollars).
Programming languages
The 5100 was available with APL, BASIC, or both programming languages. At the time of introduction, APL was generally available only on mainframe computers, and most desktop sized computers such as the Wang 2200 or HP 9830 offered only BASIC. Machines that supported both languages provided a toggle switch on the front panel to select the language. When the engineers at IBM asked one beta tester, Donald Polonis, for his analysis, he commented that if folks had to learn APL to use it, the IBM 5100 would not make it as a personal computer. He tried to impress the fact that a personal computer had to be easy to use to be accepted.[citation needed] Presumably, the special APL character set and APL keyboard were the primary obstacles to newcomers learning APL easily. APL had powerful features for manipulating data as vectors and matrices, while the competing HP 9830 had to offer language extensions on an add-on ROM for matrix operations.
Problem-Solver Libraries
IBM offered three Problem-Solver Libraries, contained in magnetic tape cartridges, with the IBM 5100 to provide more than 100 interactive routines applicable to mathematical problems, statistical techniques and financial analyses.
Emulator in microcode
The 5100 was based on IBM's innovative concept that, using an emulator written in microcode, a small and relatively cheap computer could run programs already written for much larger, and much more expensive, existing computers, without the time and expense of writing and debugging new programs. Two such programs were included: a slightly modified version of APL.SV, IBM's APL interpreter for its System/370 mainframes, and the BASIC interpreter used on IBM's System/3 minicomputer. Consequently, the 5100's microcode was written to emulate most of the functionality of both a System/370 and a System/3. IBM later used the same approach for its 1983 introduction of the XT/370 model of the IBM PC, which was a standard IBM PC XT with the addition of a System/370 emulator card.
In Popular Culture
John Titor - A self-proclaimed time traveler supposedly sent to 1975 to retrieve an IBM 5100 The Visual Novel/Manga/Anime series Steins;Gate makes numerous references as a plot device, such as when they needed it to crack some of SERN's files.
References
IBM 5100 Portable Computer (http:/ / www-03. ibm. com/ ibm/ history/ exhibits/ pc/ pc_2. html) IBM Archives. Retrieved 09-25-2011.
IBM 5100
External links
IBM 5100 Portable Computer (http://www.brouhaha.com/~eric/retrocomputing/ibm/5100/) IBM 5100 (http://oldcomputers.net/ibm5100.html) from oldcomputers.net IBM-5100 (http://www.oldcomputermuseum.com/ibm_5100.html) and collection of old digital and analog computers at oldcomputermuseum.com
IBM Personal Computers Succeededby IBM 5110
License
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 //creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/