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Time-Line computer Archive Ltd is a not for profit company, our aim is to collect, restore and exhibit all types of early computers and electronics.

We hope that our website will give an insight to the development of computing and will help give inspiration to other people to collect rather than throw out historical electronics.

We also would like to make a record of peoples experiences of early Computing and Electronics primarily from Scotland and the North of England but also from Great Britain generally. If you have any Experiences of early computing or Electronics please don't hesitate to contact us.

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IBM 1620

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The IBM 1620 was announced by IBM on October 21, 1959 and marketed as an inexpensive "scientific computer". After a total production of about two thousand machines, it was withdrawn on November 19, 1970. Modified versions of the 1620 were used as the CPU of the IBM 1710 and IBM 1720 Industrial Process Control Systems (making it the first digital computer considered reliable enough for real-time process control of factory equipment).

Being variable word length decimal, as opposed to fixed-word-length pure binary, made it as especially attractive first computer to learn on — and hundreds of thousands of students had their first experiences with a computer on the IBM 1620.

Core memory cycle times were 20 microseconds for the Model I, 10 microseconds for the Model II (about a thousand times slower than typical computer main memory in 2006).

Many in the user community recall the 1620 being referred to as CADET, jokingly meaning "Can't Add, Doesn't Even Try", referring to the use of addition tables in memory rather than dedicated addition circuitry.
 
Source: Wikipedia