🚀 go-pugleaf

On 2018-03-19, Dan Espen <dan1...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Rich Alderson <ne...@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
>
>> Dan Espen <dan1...@gmail.com> writes:
>>
>>> hanc...@bbs.cpcn.com writes:
>>
>>>> As Campbell-Kelly explains in their book, the beauty of the 
>>>> IBM 1401 was not in its electronics (not a big deal) but rather
>>>> the 1403 printer, which gave high quality at a significantly
>>>> faster rate.  As mentioned, I remain amazed that for _years_,
>>>> customers tolerated wavy lines of other mainframe line printers,
>>>> even slow ones.
>>>
>>> Just to defend the slower IBM 1443 common on the 1440, it produced
>>> pretty high quality output.
>>
>> I'm going to disagree with this.  I learned to program on a 1401/1402/1403
>> system as a senior in high school.  When I was exposed to the 1442 attached
>> to the IBM 1800 at the CAI Laboratory at UTexas the next year, I was appalled
>> at the print quality.
>
> Of course you would be unhappy, the 1442 was a card reader punch.
> :)
> Yeah, I know typo.
>
> Anyway I remember it as pretty good but I don't have any listings from
> a 1443 and Google isn't helping.  Vertical alignment should have
> been perfect.  Horizontal would be based on timing circuits, possibly
> your printer was out of adjustment.  Print density should be similar to
> a 1403, the hammer had to hit the paper pretty much the same way.

I remember seeing printouts from a 2780 RJE station, whose print mechanism
was (IIRC) basically a 1443.  They were quite crisp and clear.  The printer
was much slower than a 1403, though.

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