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82-506: A cover story on Popular Electronics could launch a new product or company. The most famous issue, January 1975, had the Altair 8800 computer on the cover and ignited the home computer revolution. Paul Allen showed that issue to Bill Gates . They wrote a BASIC interpreter for the Altair computer and started Microsoft . Radio & Television News was a magazine for professionals and

164-450: A computer terminal and a modem a user could dial into a large multi-user computer. Lee Felsenstein wanted make low-cost versions of modems and terminals available to the hobbyist. The March 1976 issue had the " Pennywhistle Modem " and the July 1976 issue had the "SOL Intelligent Terminal". The SOL, built by Processor Technology , was really an Altair compatible computer and became one of

246-418: A sans-serif typeface in a rectangular box. The covers featured a large image of the feature story, usually a construction project. In September 1970 the cover logo was changed to an underlined serif typeface. The magazine's content, typography and layout were also updated. In January 1972 the cover logo added a second line, "including Electronics World", and the volume number was restarted at 1. This second line

328-528: A wave soldering machine and an assembly line at the new location. In January 1972, Popular Electronics merged with another Ziff-Davis magazine, Electronics World . The change in editorial staff upset many of their authors, and they started writing for a competing magazine, Radio-Electronics . In 1972 and 1973, some of the best construction projects appeared in Radio-Electronics . In 1974, Art Salsberg became editor of Popular Electronics . It

410-413: A 4K static memory that was plug-in compatible with the Altair 8800 and sold for $ 255. His company was Processor Technology , one of the most successful Altair compatible board suppliers. Their advertisement in the July 1975 issue of Popular Electronics promised interface and PROM boards in addition to the 4K memory board. They would later develop a popular video display board that would plug directly into

492-600: A bachelor's degree in mathematics and physics in 1957 from Southwest Texas State . After college he married Helen Wentz, moved to San Antonio and became a research engineer in the electrical engineering department of Southwest Research Institute . He soon started writing hobbyist articles. The first was in Electronics World (May 1960) and later he had a two part cover feature for Radio-Electronics (October, November 1962). The March 1963 issue of Popular Electronics featured his ultrasonic listening device on

574-559: A copy of the kit. The calculator was successful and was followed by several improved models. The MITS 1440 calculator was featured in the July 1973 issues of Radio-Electronics . It had a 14-digit display, memory, and square root function. The kit sold for $ 200 and the assembled version was $ 250 . MITS later developed a programmer unit that would connect to the 816 or 1440 calculator and allow programs of up to 256 steps. In 1972, Texas Instruments developed its own calculator chip and started selling complete calculators at less than half

656-472: A decade, colleges had required science and engineering majors to take a course in computer programming, typically using the FORTRAN or BASIC languages. This meant there was a sizable customer base who knew about computers. In 1970, electronic calculators were not seen outside of a laboratory, but by 1974 they were a common household item. Calculators and video games like Pong introduced computer power to

738-637: A feature about light-emitting diodes. At one of our midnight meetings I suggested that we emulate Southwest Technical Products and develop a project article for Popular Electronics. The article would give us free advertising for the kit version of the project, and the magazine would even pay us for the privilege of printing it! The November 1970 issue also has an article by Forrest M. Mims and Henry E. Roberts titled "Assemble an LED Communicator - The Opticon." A kit of parts could be ordered from MITS in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Popular Electronics paid $ 400 for

820-565: A feature story on Southwest Technical Products in November 1972. "Meyer built his mail-order business from scratch to more than $ 1 million in sales in six years." The company was shipping 100 kits a day from 18,000 square feet (1,700 m ) of buildings. In the first ten years, SWTPC's most popular products were audio kits followed by test equipment. There was also typical 1970s products like color organs that would synchronize colored lights with music as well as strobe lights. Dan Meyer developed

902-539: A feature story on Southwest Technical Products in November 1972. "Meyer built his mail-order business from scratch to more than $ 1 million in sales in six years." The company was shipping 100 kits a day from 1800 square feet (1,700 m) of buildings. Others noticed SWTPC success. Forrest Mims , a founder of MITS (Altair 8800), tells about his " Light-Emitting Diodes " cover story ( Popular Electronics , November 1970) in an interview with Creative Computing . In March, I sold my first article to Popular Electronics magazine,

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984-477: A full range of construction projects using the newest technologies such as microprocessors and other programmable devices. In November 1982 the magazine became Computers & Electronics . There were more equipment reviews and fewer construction projects. One of the last major projects was a bidirectional analog-to-digital converter for the Apple II computer published in July and August 1983. Art Salsberg left at

1066-418: A heart attack. In 1982, Ziff was diagnosed with prostate cancer so he asked his three sons (ages 14 to 20) if they wanted to run a publishing empire. They did not. Ziff wanted to simplify the estate by selling some of the magazines. In November 1984, CBS bought the consumer group for $ 362.5 million and Rupert Murdoch bought the business group for $ 350 million. This left Ziff-Davis with the computer group and

1148-552: A kit based on a magazine article had been around since the early days of radio. Daniel Meyer perfected the process. In 1967, Popular Electronics had six articles by Dan Meyer and four by Don Lancaster. Seven of that year's cover stories featured kits sold by SWTPC. In the years 1966 to 1971, SWTPC's authors wrote 64 articles and had 25 cover stories in Popular Electronics . (Don Lancaster alone had 23 articles and 10 were cover stories.) The San Antonio Express-News did

1230-562: A kit. The first 50 IMSAI computers shipped in December 1975. The IMSAI 8080 computer improved on the original Altair design in several areas. It was easier to assemble: The Altair required 60 wire connections between the front panel and the motherboard ( backplane ). The IMSAI required only two soldered connections between the front panel and power supply. The MITS motherboard consisted of 4 slot segments that had to be connected together with 100 wires. The IMSAI motherboard implemented 22 slots on

1312-637: A letter to its sales force stating that the MITS Altair 8800 computer used standard Intel 8080 parts. The sales force should sell the Intellec system based on its merits and that no one should make derogatory comments about valued customers like MITS. The letter was reprinted in the August 1975 issue of MITS Computer Notes. The "cosmetic defect" rumor has appeared in many accounts over the years although both MITS and Intel issued written denials in 1975. For

1394-586: A low cost video display. In July 1974 Radio-Electronics published the Mark-8 Personal Minicomputer based on the Intel 8008 processor. The publishers noted the success of Radio-Electronics and Arthur P. Salsberg took over as Editor in 1974. Salsberg and Technical Editor, Leslie Solomon, brought back the featured construction projects. Popular Electronics needed a computer project so they selected Ed Roberts' Altair 8800 computer based on

1476-509: A modest success and MITS wanted to try a kit that would appeal to more hobbyists. The November 1970 issue of Popular Electronics featured the Opticom, a kit from MITS that would send voice over an LED light beam. As Mims and Cagle were losing interest in the kit business, Roberts bought his partners out, then began developing a calculator kit. Electronic Arrays had just announced the EAS100,

1558-585: A new building on a 3-acre (12,000 m) site in San Antonio. The Daniel E. Meyer Company (DEMCO) became Southwest Technical Products Corporation ( SWTPC ) that fall. In 1967, Popular Electronics had 6 articles by Dan Meyer and 4 by Don Lancaster. Seven of that year's cover stories featured kits sold by SWTPC. In the years 1966 to 1971 SWTPC's authors wrote 64 articles and had 25 cover stories in Popular Electronics . (Don Lancaster alone had 23 articles and 10 were cover stories.) The San Antonio Express-News did

1640-443: A reader with his radio equipment each month. (Almost all of the readers were male.) Lou Garner's Transistor Topics covers the new transistorized FM stereo receivers and several readers' circuits. John T. Frye's fictional characters, Carl and Jerry, use a PH meter to locate the source of pollution in a river. As Editor, Olivier Ferrell built a stable of authors who contributed interesting construction projects. These projects established

1722-417: A self-made simulator for the 8080 on a PDP-10 mainframe computer . They figured that they had 30 days before someone else beat them to the punch, and once they had a version working on the simulator, Allen flew to Albuquerque to deliver the program, Altair BASIC (aka MITS 4K BASIC), on a paper tape . The first time it was run, it displayed "READY", then Allen typed "PRINT 2+2", and it immediately printed

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1804-408: A sense, then, Modern Electronics is the successor to the original concept of Popular Electronics … The last issue of Computers & Electronics was April 1985. The magazine still had 600,000 readers but the intense competition from other computer magazines resulted in flat advertising revenues. In 1953, William B. Ziff, Jr. (age 23) was thrust into the publishing business when his father died of

1886-534: A serial interface board and at least one or two 4096 word memory boards, depending on the language variant. MITS Price List, Popular Electronics , August 1975. MITS had no competition in the US for the first half of 1975. Their 4K memory board used dynamic RAM and it had several design problems. The delay in shipping optional boards and the problems with the 4K memory board created an opportunity for outside suppliers. An enterprising Altair owner, Robert Marsh, designed

1968-479: A series of very low intermodulation (IM) distortion audio power amplifiers known as Tigers, many still in use today. Don Lancaster developed a series of decimal readout counters and voltmeters that used the latest technology. In mid 1975 Dan Meyer asked one of his engineers, Gary Kay, to design a computer based on the Motorola 6800 design kit. The first deliveries were in November 1975. In June 1976 SWTPC introduced

2050-418: A set of six large scale integrated (LSI) circuit chips that would make a four-function calculator. The MITS 816 calculator kit used the chipset and was featured on the November 1971 cover of Popular Electronics . This calculator kit sold for $ 175 , or $ 275 assembled. Forrest Mims wrote the assembly manual for this kit and many others over the next several years. As payment for each manual he often accepted

2132-544: A single segment. The IMSAI replaced the Altair's one-shot clock generator with the Intel 8224. The IMSAI also had a larger power supply to handle the increasing number of expansion boards used in typical systems. The IMSAI advantage was short lived because MITS had recognized these shortcomings and developed the Altair 8800B, which was introduced in June 1976. In 1977, Pertec Computer Corporation purchased MITS and began to market

2214-769: A terminal Altair could be programmed using its front-panel switches. While serving at the Air Force Weapons Laboratory at Kirtland Air Force Base , Ed Roberts and Forrest M. Mims III decided to use their electronics background to produce small kits for model rocket hobbyists. In 1969, Roberts and Mims, along with Stan Cagle and Robert Zaller, founded Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS) in Roberts' garage in Albuquerque, New Mexico , and started selling radio transmitters and instruments for model rockets. The model rocket kits were

2296-529: A two-piece case. The backplane and power supply were mounted on a base plate, along with the front and rear of the box. The "lid" was shaped like a C, forming the top, left, and right sides of the box. The front panel , which was inspired by the Data General Nova minicomputer, included a large number of toggle switches to feed binary data directly into the memory of the machine, and a number of red LEDs to read those values back out. Programming

2378-573: A year. Les Solomon , the Popular Electronics Technical Editor, wrote 6 articles in the rival Radio-Electronics using the pseudonym "B. R. Rogen". In 1972 and 1973 some of the best projects appeared in Radio-Electronics as the new Popular Electronics digested the merger. The upcoming personal computer benefited from this competition between Radio-Electronics and Popular Electronics . In September 1973 Radio-Electronics published Don Lancaster's TV Typewriter ,

2460-637: Is how Art Salsberg described the new magazine. Directed to enthusiasts like yourselves, who savor learning more about the latest developments in electronics and computer hardware, Modern Electronics shows you what's new in the world of electronics/computers, how this equipment works, how to use them, and construction plans for useful electronic devices. Many of you probably know of me from my decade-long stewardship of Popular Electronics magazine, which changed its name and editorial philosophy last year to distance itself from active electronics enthusiasts who move fluidly across electronics and computer product areas. In

2542-486: Is that the Altair was originally going to be named the PE-8 (Popular Electronics 8-bit), but Les Solomon thought this name to be rather dull, so Les, Alexander Burawa (associate editor), and John McVeigh (technical editor) decided that: "It's a stellar event, so let's name it after a star." McVeigh suggested " Altair ", the twelfth brightest star in the sky. Ed Roberts had designed and manufactured programmable calculators and

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2624-516: The BASIC programming language for the machine. He called the company and reached a private home, where no one had heard of anything like BASIC. In fact the letter had been sent by Bill Gates and Paul Allen from the Boston area, and they had no BASIC yet to offer. When they called Roberts to follow up on the letter he expressed his interest, and the two started work on their BASIC interpreter using

2706-463: The Commodore PET were on the market. Building computer kits was soon replaced by plugging in assembled boards. In 1982, Popular Electronics helped to introduce personal computer programming with its Programmer’s Notebook column written by Jim Keogh . Each column focused on a game programming. The column continued onto Computer & Electronics Magazine. Popular Electronics continued with

2788-565: The Intellec-8 Microprocessor Development System that typically sold for a very profitable $ 10,000 . It was functionally similar to the Altair 8800 but it was a commercial grade system with a wide selection of peripherals and development software. Customers would ask Intel why their Intellec-8 was so expensive when that Altair was only $ 400 . Some salesmen said that MITS was getting cosmetic rejects or otherwise inferior chips. In July 1975, Intel sent

2870-430: The Popular Electronics projects. In January 1964 he left Southwest Research Institute to start an electronics kit company. He continued to write articles and ran the mail order kit business from his home in San Antonio, Texas. By 1965 he was providing the kits for other authors such as Lou Garner. In 1967 he sold a kit for Don Lancaster's "IC-67 Metal Locator". In early 1967 Meyer moved his growing business from his home to

2952-489: The Railway Express Agency . However, it never arrived due to a strike by the shipping company. Solomon already had a number of pictures of the machine and the article was based on them. Roberts got to work on building a replacement. The computer on the magazine cover is an empty box with just switches and LEDs on the front panel. The finished Altair computer had a completely different circuit board layout than

3034-620: The AC-30 Cassette Interface for data storage and the PR-40 printer. One could now purchase a complete computer system for about $ 1500. Many of the early hobbyist computer companies were founded by engineers who did not know how to run a business. They would fold in a year or so. SWTPC had been successful in the kit business for over a decade so they could deliver working products. Floppy Disk systems, full feature terminals, and many peripherals were added in 1977. The bus structure

3116-511: The Altair name, which editor Les Solomon later told the audience at the first Altair Computer Convention (March 1976), is that the name was inspired by Les's 12-year-old daughter, Lauren. "She said why don't you call it Altair – that's where the Enterprise is going tonight." The Star Trek episode is probably " Amok Time ", as this is the only one from The Original Series which takes the Enterprise crew to Altair (Six). Another explanation

3198-458: The Altair via the front panel could be a tedious and time-consuming process. Programming required the toggling of the switches to positions corresponding to the desired 8080 microprocessor instruction or opcode in binary, then used the "DEPOSIT NEXT" switch to load that instruction into the next address of the machine's memory. This step was repeated until all the opcodes of a presumably complete and correct program were in place. The only output from

3280-504: The Altair was to become a de facto standard in the form of the S-100 bus , and the first programming language for the machine was Microsoft 's founding product, Altair BASIC . The Altair 8800 had no built-in screen or video output, so it would have to be connected to a serial terminal (such as a VT100 -compatible terminal) to have any output. To connect it to a terminal a serial interface card had to be installed. Alternatively to using

3362-596: The Altair. A consulting company in San Leandro, California, IMS Associates, Inc. , wanted to purchase several Altair computers, but the long delivery time convinced them that they should build their own computers. In the October 1975 issue of Popular Electronics , a small advertisement announced the IMSAI 8080 computer. The ad noted that all boards were " plug compatible " with the Altair 8800. The computer cost $ 439 as

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3444-675: The Canadian company Micro Computer Machines); the National Semiconductor IMP-8 and IMP-16 required external hardware; the Motorola 6800 was still in development. So he chose the 8-bit Intel 8080 . At that time, Intel's main business was selling memory chips by the thousands to computer companies. They had no experience in selling small quantities of microprocessors. When the 8080 was introduced in April 1974, Intel set

3526-514: The January issue of Popular Electronics , MITS was flooded with inquiries and orders. They had to hire extra people just to answer the phones. In February MITS received 1,000 orders for the Altair 8800. The quoted delivery time was 60 days but it was months before they could meet that. Roberts focused on delivering the computer; all of the options would wait until they could keep pace with the orders. MITS claimed to have delivered 2,500 Altair 8800s by

3608-489: The January launch date. So during the construction of the second model, he decided to build most of the machine on removable cards, reducing the motherboard to nothing more than an interconnect between the cards, a backplane . The basic machine consisted of five cards, including the CPU on one and memory on another. He then looked for a cheap source of connectors and came across a supply of 100-pin edge connectors . The S-100 bus

3690-426: The July 1974 cover of Radio-Electronics . The computer trainer was put on hold and the editors looked for a real computer system. ( Popular Electronics gave Jerry Ogden a column, Computer Bits , starting in June 1975.) One of the editors, Les Solomon, knew MITS was working on an Intel 8080 based computer project and thought Roberts could provide the project for the always popular January issue. The TV Typewriter and

3772-565: The Mark-8 computer projects were just a detailed set of plans and a set of bare printed circuit boards. The hobbyist faced the daunting task of acquiring all of the integrated circuits and other components. The editors of Popular Electronics wanted a complete kit in a professional-looking enclosure. Ed Roberts and his head engineer, Bill Yates, finished the first prototype in October 1974 and shipped it to Popular Electronics in New York via

3854-414: The article. Radio & Television News became Electronics World in 1959 and in January 1972 was merged into Popular Electronics . The process started in the summer of 1971 with a new editor, Milton S. Snitzer, replacing the longtime editor, Oliver P. Ferrell. The publishers decided to focus on topics with prosperous advertisers, such as CB Radio and audio equipment. Construction projects were no longer

3936-482: The computer, without changes (except for branding), as the PCC 8800 in 1978. In the first design of the Altair, the parts needed to make a complete machine would not fit on a single motherboard , and the machine consisted of four boards stacked on top of each other with stand-offs. Another problem facing Roberts was that the parts needed to make a truly useful computer were not available, or would not be designed in time for

4018-605: The correct answer: "4". The game Lunar Lander was entered in, and this worked as well. Gates soon joined Allen and formed Microsoft , then spelled "Micro-Soft". Announced in late 1975, it started shipping in August 1977. Daniel Meyer (engineer) Daniel Meyer (February 6, 1932 – May 16, 1998) was the founder and president Southwest Technical Products Corporation . He was born in New Braunfels, Texas , and raised in San Marcos, Texas , where he earned

4100-406: The cover. Don Lancaster graduated from Lafayette College (1961) and Arizona State University (1966). A 1960s fad was to have colored lights synchronized with music. This psychedelic lighting was made economical by the development of the silicon controlled rectifier (SCR). Don's first published article was "Solid-State 3-Channel Color Organ" in the April 1963 issue of Electronics World . He

4182-459: The cover. The projects would often require a printed circuit board or specialized components that were not available at the local electronics parts store. Readers could purchase them directly from Dan Meyer. Dan Meyer saw the business opportunity in providing circuit boards and parts for the Popular Electronics projects. In January 1964 he left Southwest Research Institute to start an electronics kit company. He continued to write articles and ran

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4264-444: The database publisher (Information Access Company.) These groups were not profitable. Ziff took time off to successfully battle the prostate cancer. (He lived until 2006.) When he returned he focused on magazines like PC Magazine and MacUser to rebuild Ziff-Davis. In 1994 he and his sons sold Ziff-Davis for $ 1.4 billion. The title Popular Electronics was sold to Gernsback Publications and their Hands-On Electronics magazine

4346-440: The editor was Oliver P. Ferrell and the monthly circulation was 400,000. The magazine had a full page of electronics news that was called "POP'tronics News Scope." In January 2000 a successor magazine was renamed Poptronics . In the 1960s, Fawcett Publications had a competing magazine, Electronics Illustrated . The cover showed a 15-inch (38 cm) black and white TV kit by Conar that cost $ 135. The feature construction story

4428-518: The editors wanted to create a magazine for hobbyists. Ziff-Davis had started Popular Aviation in 1927 and Popular Photography in 1934 but found that Gernsback Publications had the trademark on Popular Electronics. It was used in Radio-Craft from 1943 until 1948. Ziff-Davis bought the trademark and started Popular Electronics with the October 1954 issue. Many of the editors and authors worked for both Ziff-Davis magazines. Initially Oliver Read

4510-475: The end of 1983 and Seth R. Alpert became editor. The magazine dropped all project articles and just reviewed hardware and software. The circulation was almost 600,000 in January 1985 when Forrest Mims wrote about the tenth anniversary of the Altair 8800 computer. In October 1984 Art Salsberg started a competing magazine, Modern Electronics . Editor Alexander W. Burawa and contributors Forrest Mims, Len Feldman, and Glenn Hauser moved to Modern Electronics . Here

4592-433: The end of May. The number was over 5,000 by August 1975. MITS had under 20 employees in January but had grown to 90 by October 1975. The Altair 8800 computer was a break-even sale for MITS. They needed to sell additional memory boards, I/O boards and other options to make a profit. The system came with a "1024 word" (1024 byte) memory board populated with 256 bytes. The BASIC language was announced in July 1975 and required

4674-508: The feature articles. They were replaced by new product reviews. The change in editorial direction upset many authors. Dan Meyer wrote a letter in his SWTPC catalog referring to the magazine, Popular Electronics with Electronics World , as "PEEW". He urged his customers to switch to Radio-Electronics . Don Lancaster , Daniel Meyer , Forrest Mims , Ed Roberts , John Simonton and other authors switched to Radio-Electronics. Even Solid State columnist Lou Garner moved to Radio-Electronics for

4756-497: The first year. By the end of 1975 there were a dozen companies producing computer kits and peripherals using the Altair circuit bus, later renamed the S-100 bus and set as an IEEE standard. The February 1975 issue featured an "All Solid-State TV Camera" by three Stanford University students: Terry Walker, Harry Garland and Roger Melen . While the Cyclops Camera , as it was called, was designed to use an oscilloscope for

4838-442: The general public. Electronics hobbyists were moving on to digital projects such as digital voltmeters and frequency counters. The Altair had enough power to be actually useful, and was designed as an expandable system that opened it up to all sorts of applications. Ed Roberts optimistically told his banker that he could sell 800 computers, while in reality they needed to sell 200 over the next year just to break even. When readers got

4920-563: The image display, the article mentions that it could also be connected to the Altair computer. It soon was, the authors got one of the first Altair computers and designed an interface for the camera. They also designed a full color video display for the Altair, "The TV Dazzler" , that appeared on the cover of the February 1976 issue. This was the start of Cromemco , a computer company that grew to over 500 employees by 1983. The internet did not exist in 1975 but time-sharing computers did. With

5002-399: The improved Intel 8080 processor. The January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics had the Altair computer on the cover and this launched the home computer revolution. (However, Walter Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs incorrectly identified the magazine that ran the article as Popular Mechanics .) The magazine was digest size ( 6.5 in × 9 in ) for the first 20 years. The cover logo was

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5084-418: The individual parts were purchased at a local electronics store or by mail order. The early issues often showed these as father and son projects. Most of the early projects used vacuum tubes , as transistors (which had just become available to hobbyists) were expensive: the small-signal Raytheon CK722 transistor was US$ 3.50 in the December 1954 issue, while a typical small-signal vacuum tube (the 12AX7 )

5166-471: The mail order kit business from his home garage in San Antonio, Texas. By 1965 he was providing the kits for other authors such as Lou Garner. In 1967 he sold a kit for Don Lancaster 's "IC-67 Metal Locator". In early 1967 Meyer moved his growing business from his home to a new building on a 3-acre (12,000 m ) site in San Antonio. The Daniel E. Meyer Company (DEMCO) became Southwest Technical Products Corporation ( SWTPC ) that fall. The concept of selling

5248-617: The most successful personal computers at that time. Popular Electronics had many other computer projects such as the Altair 680, the Speechlab voice recognition board and the COSMAC ELF . They did not have the field to themselves. A dedicated computer magazine, Byte , was started in September 1975. It was soon followed by other new magazines. By the end of 1977, fully assembled computers such as Apple II , Radio Shack TRS-80 , and

5330-448: The price of other commercial models. MITS and many other companies were devastated by this, and Roberts struggled to reduce his quarter-million-dollar debt. In addition to calculators, MITS made a line of test equipment kits. These included an IC tester, a waveform generator, a digital voltmeter, and several other instruments. To keep up with the demand, MITS moved into a larger building at 6328 Linn NE in Albuquerque in 1973. They installed

5412-416: The programs was the patterns of lights on the panel. Nevertheless, many were sold in this form. Development was already underway on additional cards, including a paper tape reader for storage, additional RAM cards, and an RS-232 interface to connect to a proper teletype terminal . Ed Roberts received a letter from Traf-O-Data asking whether he would be interested in buying what would eventually be

5494-452: The prototype shown in the magazine. The January 1975 issues appeared on newsstands a week before Christmas of 1974 and the kit was officially (if not yet practically) available for sale. The typical MITS product had a generic name like the " Model 1440 Calculator " or the " Model 1600 Digital Voltmeter ". Ed Roberts was busy finishing the design and left the naming of the computer to the editors of Popular Electronics . One explanation of

5576-416: The single unit price at $ 360 ($ 2220 in 2023). "That figure had a nice ring to it," recalled Intel's Dave House in 1984. "Besides, it was a computer, and they usually cost thousands of dollars, so we felt it was a reasonable price." Ed Roberts had experience in buying OEM quantities of calculator chips and he was able to negotiate a $ 75 price ($ 460 in 2023) for the 8080 microprocessor chips. Intel made

5658-540: The style of Popular Electronics for years to come. Two of the most prolific authors were Daniel Meyer and Don Lancaster. Daniel Meyer graduated from Southwest Texas State (1957) and became an engineer at Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. He soon started writing hobbyist articles. The first was in Electronics World (May 1960) and latter he had a 2 part cover feature for Radio-Electronics (October, November 1962). The March 1963 issue of Popular Electronics featured his ultrasonic listening device on

5740-443: Was $ 0.61. Lou Garner wrote the feature story for the first issue, a battery-powered tube radio that could be used on a bicycle. Later he was given a column called Transistor Topics (June 1956). Transistors soon cost less than a dollar and transistor projects became common in every issue of Popular Electronics . The column was renamed to Solid State in 1965 and ran under his byline until December 1978. The July 1962 issue had 112 pages,

5822-484: Was Salsberg's goal to reclaim the lead in electronics projects. He was impressed with Don Lancaster 's TV Typewriter ( Radio Electronics , September 1973) article and wanted computer projects for Popular Electronics . Don Lancaster did an ASCII keyboard for Popular Electronics in April 1974. They were evaluating a computer trainer project by Jerry Ogden when the Mark-8 8008 -based computer by Jonathan Titus appeared on

5904-466: Was a "Radiation Fallout Monitor" for "keeping track of the radiation level in your neighborhood." (The Cuban Missile Crisis happened that October.) Other construction projects included "The Fish Finder", an underwater temperature probe; the "Transistorized Tremolo" for an electric guitar; and a one tube VHF receiver to listen to aircraft. There were regular columns for Citizens Band (CB), amateur radio and shortwave listening (SWL). These would show

5986-455: Was about two high school boys, Carl and Jerry. Each month the boys would have an adventure that would teach the reader about electronics. By 1954 building audio and radio kits was a growing pastime. Heathkit and many others offered kits that included all of the parts with detailed instructions. The premier cover shows the assembly of a Heathkit A-7B audio amplifier. Popular Electronics would offer projects that were built from scratch; that is,

6068-456: Was eventually acknowledged by the professional computer community and adopted as the IEEE-696 computer bus standard. The Altair bus consists of the pins of the Intel 8080 run out onto the backplane. No particular level of thought went into the design, which led to disasters such as shorting from various power lines of differing voltages being located next to each other. Another oddity

6150-583: Was familiar with the microprocessors available in 1974. He thought the Intel 4004 and Intel 8008 were not powerful enough (in fact several microcomputers based on Intel chips were already on the market: the Canadian company Microsystems International 's CPS-1 built-in 1972 used a MIL MF7114 chip modeled on the 4004, the Micral marketed in January 1973 by the French company R2E and the MCM/70 marketed in 1974 by

6232-477: Was featured on the cover of the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics and was sold by mail order through advertisements there, in Radio-Electronics , and in other hobbyist magazines. According to Harry Garland, the Altair 8800 was the product that catalyzed the microcomputer revolution of the 1970s . It was the first commercially successful personal computer. The computer bus designed for

6314-467: Was moved from the Table of Contents page to the cover. There is debate about what machine was the first personal computer, the Altair 8800 (1975), the Mark-8 (1974), or even back to Kenbak-1 (1971). The computer in the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics captured the attention of the 400,000 or so readers. Before then, home computers were lucky to sell a hundred units. The Altair sold thousands in

6396-420: Was paid $ 150 for the story. The projects in Popular Electronics changed from vacuum tube to solid state in the early 1960s. Tube circuits used a metal chassis with sockets, transistor circuits worked best on a printed circuit board . They would often contain components that were not available at the local electronics parts store. Dan Meyer saw the business opportunity in providing circuit boards and parts for

6478-437: Was renamed to Popular Electronics in February 1989. This version was published until it was merged with Electronics Now to become Poptronics in January 2000. In late 2002, Gernsback Publications went out of business and the January 2003 Poptronics was the last issue. Altair 8800 The Altair 8800 is a microcomputer designed in 1974 by MITS and based on the Intel 8080 CPU . Interest grew quickly after it

6560-533: Was that the system included two unidirectional 8-bit data buses , when the normal practice was for a single bidirectional bus (this oddity did, however, allow a later expansion of the S-100 standard to 16 bits bidirectional by using both 8-bit buses in parallel). A deal on power supplies led to the use of +8  V and ±18 V, which had to be locally regulated on the cards to TTL (+5 V) or RS-232 (±12 V) standard voltage levels. The Altair shipped in

6642-529: Was the editor of both Radio & Television News and Popular Electronics . Read was promoted to Publisher in June 1956. Oliver Perry Ferrell took over as editor of Popular Electronics and William A. Stocklin became editor of Radio & Television News . In Radio & TV News John T. Frye wrote a column on a fictional repair shop where the proprietor, Mac, would interact with other technicians and customers. The reader would learn repair techniques for servicing radios and TVs. In Popular Electronics his column

6724-430: Was used for two years. The large photo of the feature project was gone, replaced by a textual list of articles. In August 1974 the magazine switched to a larger letter size format ( 8.5 in × 11 in ). This was done to allow larger illustrations such as schematics, to switch printing to offset presses, and respond to advertisers desire for larger ad pages. The longtime tag line, "World's Largest Selling Electronics Magazine",

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