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Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01YDRjtmAiNpo5mK5N3d7QwZ
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co-authored by Claude Opus 5.5
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---
title: Terak Corporation 8510 Data Processor
categories:
- Computers
types:
- Professional Computer
origins:
- U.S.A.
years:
- '1976'
cpus:
- 16-bit DEC LSI-11
params:
name: 8510 Data Processor
image: /media/museum/photos/terak_8510a_1s.jpg
company: /companies/terak-corporation
company_name: Terak Corporation
specs:
- label: NAME
value: 8510 Data Processor
- label: MANUFACTURER
value: Terak Corporation
- label: TYPE
value: Professional Computer
- label: ORIGIN
value: U.S.A.
- label: YEAR
value: august 1976
- label: CPU
value: 16-bit DEC LSI-11/2 (EIS/FIS) or optional DEC LSI-11/23 (MMU/EIS/FPP)
- label: RAM
value: 64 KB (LSI-11/2), 128KB (LSI-11/23), expandable to 256 KB
- label: TEXT MODES
value: 24x80
- label: GRAPHIC MODES
value: 320x240
- label: COLORS
value: Black & White display
- label: SOUND
value: Yess
- label: SIZE / WEIGHT
value: 31 cm (W) x 19cm (H) x 46cm (D) / 20.6 Kg
- label: I/O PORTS
value: 4 x RS232C serial ports
- label: BUILT IN MEDIA
value: Two two-sided double density floppy drives (IBM 3740 compatible). Can read single density (0.25 MB), double density (0.6 MB) or quad density (1.2 MB)
- label: PRICE
value: $7850 (USA, 1978)
tabs:
- photos
- adverts
- emulators
- links
photos:
- title: 8510A MODEL
subtitle: ''
text: |-
as pictured in the official commercial documentation
Thanks to [Bitsavers](http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/) for this picture.
image: /media/museum/photos/terak_8510a_1.jpg
- title: 8510 DATA PROCESSOR
subtitle: ''
text: |-
The unit itself, sold as the 8510 Data Processor
Thanks to [www.computerhistory.org](https://www.computerhistory.org/) for this picture.
image: null
- title: BACK FOR THE SYSTEM
subtitle: ''
text: Thanks to [www.computerhistory.org](https://www.computerhistory.org/) for this picture.
image: /media/museum/photos/terak_8510_back_1.jpg
- title: REAR CONNECTORS
subtitle: ''
text: ''
image: /media/museum/photos/terak_8510_back_2.jpg
- title: SOME EXAMPLES OF BITMAP PICTURES
subtitle: ''
text: |-
generated by the Terak 8510a at the end of the 70s !! Quite impressive.
Thanks to http://www.threedee.com/jcm/terak/ for these images
image: /media/museum/photos/terak_8510_graf_surface_1.jpg
adverts:
- title: TERAK 8510A BROCHURE - PAGE 1
subtitle: ''
text: ''
image: /media/museum/pubs/terak_8510a_brochure_1.jpg
- title: TERAK 8510A BROCHURE - PAGE 2
subtitle: ''
text: ''
image: /media/museum/pubs/terak_8510a_brochure_2.jpg
- title: TERAK 8510A BROCHURE - PAGE 3
subtitle: ''
text: ''
image: /media/museum/pubs/terak_8510a_brochure_3.jpg
- title: TERAK 8510A BROCHURE - PAGE 4
subtitle: ''
text: ''
image: /media/museum/pubs/terak_8510a_brochure_4.jpg
emulators:
- title: bk-terak-emu
url: https://sourceforge.net/projects/bk-terak-emu/
platform: Unix / Linux
text: Elektronika BK-0010, Elektronika BK-0011M and Terak 8510/a (preliminary) emulator for Linux
links:
- title: Bitsavers
url: http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/terak/
text: Bitsavers.org has a lot of Terak documentations
- title: Mark Riordan's home page!
url: http://www.60bits.net/msu/mycomp/terak/terframe.htm
text: Some info about the Terak systems here
- title: The Terak Museum
url: http://www.threedee.com/jcm/terak/
text: Some valuable infos about the Terak systems including amazing screenshots
oc_id: 1314
source:
url: https://web.archive.org/web/20230601215344/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=1314
date: '2023-06-01'
---
The Terak 8510 is a complete stand-alone micro-computer based on DEC's LSI-11 chipset (16-bit !), in other words, it si a PDP-11 compatible. It was one of the first high-end microcomputers and among the first desktop personal computers to offer a bitmap graphics display.
It was capable of running a stripped version of UNIX version 6. It was the first personal machine on which the UCSD p-System was widely used. Various universities in the USA used it in the late 1970s through mid-1980s to teach Pascal programming. It provided immediate graphic feedback from simple programs encouraging students to learn.
A complete disk operating system is available including single and multi-user BASIC, FORTRAN IV, APL and PASCAL.
While the 8510 Data Processor is the computer itself, the The 8510/a Graphics Computer System consists of the Model 8510 Data Processor, with FIS/EIS (Hardware floating point option) a 56K Byte memory/ video controller unit and the Model 8532 Keyboard/ Display.
This special configuration provides the user with a flexible disc based digital computer system, programmable through a variety of standard languages, with the added capabilities of producing medium resolution raster scan graphics. User programs can display both characters and graphics, independently or simultaneously in any combination of three zones in the display area. The character dot pattern is alterable through program control of a writeable character generator (192 character set capability) facilitating any special character representation desired including foreign language character sets.
Three entrepreneurs created the company in 1975: Brian Benzar, William Mayberry and Dennis Kodimer. Terak products were manufactured in Scottsdale, Arizona from 1976 thru 1984. Sales reached $10M and Terak was publicly traded in 1983-84. Besides the original frame-buffer-centric 8510/a, other products were developed: color graphics and a Unix workstation. Eventually Terak succumbed to two forces: the sales juggernaughts of Sun, IBM and Apple plus venture capitalists with little expertise in the computer industry.