Editing Datapoint (section)

==Datapoint 2200 and the Intel 8008==
Having raised $4 million in an IPO in August 1969, selling over the counter for $8, by August 1970 the shares were selling at $45.

Ray and Roche wanted to develop a new, more intelligent terminal, and employed a trio of engineers who knew each other from their interests in [[amateur radio]]: [[Victor Poor]], Harry Pyle and undergraduate [[Jonathan Schmidt]]. The company began development on the [[Datapoint 2200]], its most popular product and credited by some historians as the invention of the [[personal computer]].<ref name=Wood/>

While working his notice from [[Maryland]]-based Frederick Electronics during the 1969 [[Thanksgiving]] holiday, Poor and Pyle developed the underlying [[instruction set architecture]] of the processor on a living room floor. This enabled Phil Ray and Gus Roche to design and develop the mass-produced programmable 2200, which could load various emulations stored on [[cassette tape]]s. Some users of the terminals chose to use them as simple programmable computers instead.<ref name=Wood>{{cite web |url=http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9111341 |title=Forgotten PC history: The true origins of the personal computer. |publisher=computerworld.com |access-date=August 8, 2008 |author=Wood, Lamont |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080813232453/http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9111341 |archive-date=August 13, 2008 }}</ref>

The original 2200 processor board was a [[Serial computer|serial]] design using standard [[Transistor–transistor logic|TTL]] and Intel [[shift register]]s for memory. <ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/datapoint/6600/60430_Datapoint_6600_Reference_Man_May77.pdf|title=Product Specification and Hardware Reference Manual Datapoint 6600|page=49|publisher=Datapoint Corporation|date=May 17, 1977}}</ref>

In December 1969 Poor joined CTC as Technical Director, employing Pyle within his team and sponsoring Schmidt through his degree.

CTC did not believe it could meet its design goals for the CPU built from discrete [[transistor-transistor logic|TTL]] [[integrated circuit|chip]]s. Ray and Roche asked how much of their design could fit onto a microprocessor chip. Poor and Pyle developed a project that would cost $100,000 to place their architecture onto silicon and into production.<ref name=FlorToday>{{cite news|last=Ford|first=Andrew|title=Melbourne man played key role in early computer architecture|url=http://www.floridatoday.com/article/20120730/BUSINESS/307290009|access-date=August 17, 2012|newspaper=Florida Today|date=July 28, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924043625/http://www.floridatoday.com/article/20120730/BUSINESS/307290009|archive-date=September 24, 2015}}</ref><ref name=HBeam>{{cite web|url=http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-297514005.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130510133537/http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-297514005.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=May 10, 2013|title=VIC POOR, W5SMM, RECEIVES ARRL PRESIDENT'S AWARD|publisher=States News Service|date=July 25, 2012|access-date=August 17, 2012}}</ref>

Ray and Roche arranged dinner with [[Robert Noyce]], the President of Intel, along with the President of Texas Instruments. Having pre-drawn the schematic for the microprocessor on two [[postcard]]s, Ray gave one to each of his guests, and then made a bet: that the first company to build a computer on a chip (microprocessor) would forgive Datapoint their outstanding invoice.<ref name=HelWat/>{{Dubious|date=June 2024|reason=Reference is weak and story is silly. The schematic of any processor would not fit on a postcard unless it was microfiche. The schematic would have been the serial implementation, useless to Intel/TI. How could Intel/TI find this bet attractive? The slower company gets the greater reward.}} In part this was fiscally driven, as both supplier debts were large, and the annulment of either would mean that CTC could avoid a follow-on offering. Noyce initially questioned the approach, suggesting that development of the microprocessor would reduce Intel's sales of their dumb shift registers, but eventually agreed to the deal.<ref name=HelWat/>

The result was the development of the [[Intel 8008]] microprocessor by [[Ted Hoff]] and [[Stan Mazor]] of Intel. This design was rejected by Datapoint management, when the demonstration version was not performant and Intel could not meet Datapoint's product launch date. Consequently, the 2200 was released using the conventional [[integrated circuit#SSI|SSI/MSI]] chip technology of the time.<ref>{{cite book | last =Thompson Kaye | first =Glynnis | title =A Revolution in Progress - A History to Date of Intel | publisher =Intel Corporation | year= 1984 | page =13 | url = https://www.intel.com/Assets/PDF/General/15yrs.pdf | id = Order number:231295 }} "The 8-bit 8008 microprocessor had been developed in tandem with the 4004 and was introduced in April 1972. It was originally intended to be a custom chip for Computer Terminals Corp. of Texas, later to be known as Datapoint." "As it developed, CTC rejected the 8008 because it was too slow for the company's purpose and required too many supporting chips."</ref> Datapoint continued to produce processors that went into the Datapoint 6600 around 1982 and later series.<ref name=OldBob2>{{cite web|url= https://www.ithistory.org/db/hardware/datapoint-corporation/datapoint-6600|title=The Datapoint 6600 is a new addition to the Datapoint family of processors|date=December 15, 2015 }}</ref>

Thus, today's overwhelmingly dominant [[instruction set architecture]], used in Intel's [[x86]] family of processors as well as all compatible CPUs from [[AMD]] and others, traces its ancestry directly back to CTC.<ref>{{cite news|last=Port|first=Otis|title=WHOSE BRAINCHILD WAS THE BRAIN CHIP?|url=http://www.businessweek.com/1996/50/b3505100.htm|access-date=August 18, 2012|newspaper=Business Week Archives|date=September 12, 1996|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110827224219/http://www.businessweek.com/1996/50/b3505100.htm|archive-date=August 27, 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref> The 2200 had an optional disk drive using Shugart [[8" floppy disk|8" floppies]], single-sided, single-density, and was the first commercial computer to include them.

The Datapoint 2200 became so popular that CTC later changed its name to Datapoint Corp.

At this time the 2200 processor also had access to an [[ARCNET]] card,{{cn|date=January 2023}} contributed to by Victor Poor, now working for Datapoint. This was the first commercial [[local area network]] (LAN) card, with over ten thousand ARCNET LAN installations in use around the world. The ARCNET card in each 2200 allowed 2200's running a program to access LAN-connected 2200s with attached storage (disk) or printers. This was the first true '''Distributed Processing''' over a LAN, as used in Australian Cotton (AusCot Syd), Commodities Trading Sydney, KPMG Sydney and many other small to medium-sized businesses. The LAN was later duplicated by IBM, Banyan, Novell and others using variants of media or methodology. In response, Datapoint offered the [[Token Ring]] LAN capability to [[Tandy Corporation|Tandy]] for their [[TRS-80]], but ARCNET never really gained any foothold again.

They then asked Schmidt to write the accompanying communications software.

In later years, after the death of John Phil Ray, his widow and fellow dinner guest Brenda Ray Coffee was deposed by [[Baker Botts]], the attorneys for Texas Instruments, when TI and Intel were involved in their lawsuit as to which one "invented" the microprocessor.<ref name=HelWat>{{cite web|url=https://helenwalters.com/2011/01/09/ces-the-perfect-symbol-of-global-vandalism/#comment-127|title=CES: A Symbol of Global Vandalism|author=Brenda Ray Coffee|publisher=helenwalters.com|date=January 14, 2011|access-date=August 16, 2012}}</ref>