FYI: I'm restoring an intellec 4 mod 40 from 1974.
As I don't have a TTY or a high speed paper tape reader, I've made a 110
baud to serial TTL UART USB interface with handshake, and a very simple high
speed paper tape reader simulator with an Arduino board.
The 110/20 ma current loop interface needed some opto-isolators and a Atmel
processor to do a 110 <-> 300 baud shift in both directions. (USB plug in
serial ports don't appear to support 110 baud...)
RealTerm then can be used as a TeleType(R) lookey-likey... Does need a bit
of a front-end to respond to the 'tape advance' relay clicks...
The paper tape reader currently loads a 'compiled in' HEX file, but will get
expanded for a display and user interface to select 'paper tape' files from
a SD card.
This info can be shared...
As a usable means of extracting info from paper tape the 'e-basteln' widget
is quite handy...
https://www.e-basteln.de/computing/papertape/
A useful source of paper tape punching is to find a big iron enthusiast with
a set of 1960's kit. I've got a UK contact who's keeping an Elliott 903
going and he's made some 1" tapes from PC files.
His box of tricks talks to a PC via the parallel port and a stack of TTL to
9 volt level shifters.
Regards
Sid
-----Original Message-----
From: Gavin Scott via cctalk
Sent: Saturday, June 21, 2025 2:47 PM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Cc: Gavin Scott
Subject: [cctalk] Re: Is there a more modern replacement for paper tape
punch/reader
A paper-tape reader is easy enough, just something where you manually
pull the tape past an optical reader etc.
I have a ~cheap diode laser cutter and on my someday get around to it
list is to write a paper tape "punch" program that will cut a one foot
strip of punched paper tape out of a larger piece of paper, with the
possibility of using a roll of paper and manually advance it a foot at
a time using the sprocket holes and some pins for alignment.
On Sat, Jun 21, 2025 at 12:04 AM ben via cctalk <[email protected]>
wrote:
Now that I have my 18 bit retro computer working, I am thinking of
adding classic IO, like paper tape. Sadly I am a few decades too late.
Is there anything out there to replace a punch/reader used as 70's i/o?
Any good mag tape (cassete tape) replacements? I would love a tiny 9
track mag tape toy sized if they made one, like the wall hanging PDP8's.
On wish list, a flex writer or TTY video display replacement, ie
overstrike and underline in 2/3 size VT100 case.
Ben.
https://www.instructables.com/23-Scale-VT100-Terminal-Reproduction/
