[linux-audio-user] Re: you might already have a hardware synth in your office

Steve Harris S.W.Harris at ecs.soton.ac.uk
Mon Jun 16 09:10:01 EDT 2003


On Mon, Jun 16, 2003 at 04:36:49 -0700, Bill Schottstaedt wrote:
> On Saturday 14 June 2003 02:50 am, Frank Barknecht wrote:
> [...]
> > here's someone making music with a dot matrix printer:
> 
> When I was about 10 (around 1960), the place my father worked
> installed a barnful of IBM's; I got to tour the joint, and the
> thing I remember best was when one of the operators played
> a buzzy "Happy Birthday" on what I remember as a printer, though
> maybe it was the paper tape reader.

Cool. I heard an Elliott 803 (enormous early 60s realtime machine) playing
tunes by modulating the tape puncher (I think) off one of its serial
lines. The serial cable was about the thickness of a mans arm and attached
with hefty bolts. Makes USB look elegant ;)

http://www.retrobeep.com/computers/elliott/elliottSpecification.htm

Its in the computer preservation society at Beltchly Park in the UK.

- Steve



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