yann64andClaude Opus 5.5
3eeabe9649
6,654 pages: 1,289 machines, 702 software, 460 companies, 64 history, 17 articles, 59 fun. 4,336 media files so far; references to files not downloaded yet are left out. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com> Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01YDRjtmAiNpo5mK5N3d7QwZ
236 lines
16 KiB
Markdown
236 lines
16 KiB
Markdown
---
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title: Cifer Systems 2683
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categories:
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- Computers
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types:
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- Professional Computer
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origins:
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- United Kingdom
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years:
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- '1982'
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cpus:
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- 2 x Z80A
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params:
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name: '2683'
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image: /media/museum/photos/cifer_2683_system_s1.jpg
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company: /companies/cifer-systems
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company_name: Cifer Systems
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specs:
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- label: NAME
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value: '2683'
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- label: MANUFACTURER
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value: Cifer Systems
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- label: TYPE
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value: Professional Computer
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- label: ORIGIN
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value: United Kingdom
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- label: YEAR
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value: '1982'
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- label: BUILT IN LANGUAGE
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value: None
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- label: KEYBOARD
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value: 100 key Typewriter type with 20 function key and numeric keypad
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- label: CPU
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value: 2 x Z80A
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- label: SPEED
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value: 2.5 MHz
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- label: RAM
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value: 64 to 256 KB
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- label: VRAM
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value: 16 to 32 KB
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- label: ROM
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value: Depends on system configuration, up to 24 KB
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- label: TEXT MODES
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value: 80 characters x 25 lines - 8x12 dot char. format
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- label: GRAPHIC MODES
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value: 300 x 1024 (optional)
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- label: COLORS
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value: Monochrome. White green or orange phosphor
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- label: SOUND
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value: No sound
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- label: SIZE / WEIGHT
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value: 41 (W) x 35 (D) x 34 (H)
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- label: I/O PORTS
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value: Parallel printer (2), serial lines (2), FDD unit, Composite video
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- label: BUILT IN MEDIA
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value: Dual DS DD 48 TPI floppy-disk unit
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- label: OS
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value: CP/M 2.2
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- label: POWER SUPPLY
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value: Built-in power supply unit
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- label: PRICE
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value: Unknown
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tabs:
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- photos
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photos:
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- title: LARGE VIEW
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subtitle: ''
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text: ''
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image: /media/museum/photos/cifer_2683_system_s2.jpg
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- title: TOP VIEW
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subtitle: ''
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text: ''
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image: /media/museum/photos/cifer_2683_topview_s1.jpg
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- title: COMPLETE SYSTEM
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subtitle: ''
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text: Complete system along with its dual FDD unit.
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image: /media/museum/photos/cifer_2683_system_s3.jpg
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- title: KEYBOARD CLOSE-UP
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subtitle: ''
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text: 20 function keys allow a direct access to the most common terminal editing functions.
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image: /media/museum/photos/cifer_2683_keyboard_s1.jpg
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- title: REAR SIDE
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subtitle: ''
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text: |-
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**(1)** Terminal configuration dip switches\
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**(2)** Jack for an external composite monitor\
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**(3)** Floppy-disk unit connector\
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**(4)** Serial line connector of the terminal section\
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**(5)** Parallel printer connector of the terminal section\
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**(6)** Serial line connector of the computer section\
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**(7)** Parallel printer connector of the computer section.
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image: /media/museum/photos/cifer_2683_rearside_s1.jpg
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- title: INSIDE
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subtitle: ''
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text: |-
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The electronics was comprised of three cards:\
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**(1)** The terminal card in charge of video, keyboard and communication management,\
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**(2)** The CPU card which holds the second Z80 processor, 64 to 256 KB of RAM, the FDD controller, additional serial and parallel ports,\
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**(3)** A piggy-back ROM/EPROM card holding custom programs.
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image: /media/museum/photos/cifer_2683_inside_s1.jpg
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- title: SYSTEM CARDS
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subtitle: ''
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text: Each card uses its own Z80 processor, ROM, RAM and I/O chips.
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image: /media/museum/photos/cifer_2683_logiccards_s1.jpg
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- title: CIFER RANGE
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subtitle: ''
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text: The range of Cifer stand-alone computers in early 1982
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image: /media/museum/photos/cifer_2683_ciferrange_s1.jpg
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- title: USER MANUALS
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subtitle: ''
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text: ''
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image: /media/museum/photos/cifer_2683_manuals_s1.jpg
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comments:
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- author: Sean Brackstone & Gerry Crisp (UK)
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date: Tuesday 9th November 2004
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text: |-
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Is there anyone out there who worked for Cifer???
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Many years ago my randfather Gerry Crisp started Cifer with two friends and as the company grew they moved to new premises on Bowerhill Ind. Est. in Melksham Wilts where the company stayed untill it wnt bust. I would be interested to hear from you if you worked for Cifer and so would my grandfather.
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Many Thanks
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Sean Brackstone & Gerry Crisp
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- author: Hans-Ulrich Frey (Switzerland)
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date: Saturday 5th February 2011
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text: |-
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We still use 3 units of Chifer 2683-04-LGB computers. They were modified by MONOTYPE Corporation to support their 272-System. With this system it is possible to make text-layouts and punch control-ribbons for hot-metal composition casters.\
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The Cifer 2683 computer is the weak part of the whole system. Recently we had to take apart 3 junk machines to repair our units. We always have problems with the display-section.\
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Is there anybody that could help with spares of these machines?\
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Hans\
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www.parnassia.org
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- author: Rob Stuart (Manchester)
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date: Tuesday 1st July 2008
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text: |-
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We had hundreds of Cifer 2634's at the University of Manchester and UMIST back in the 80's. They wern't very reliable and it was my job to do the onsite repairs. This usually resulted in the machine being taken away as they were not too easy to fix.
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I seem to remember there were green and orange phosphor versions of the CRT.
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There was a guy at Cifer Systems in Melksham we used to deal with for sales. If his name comes up I will post it. I also seem to recall a technical guy who may have been called Don.
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We had hundreds of Newbury Data 7007 terminals as well. They were the 'special' versions with many pages of screen memory so you could scroll back and see what the previous user had been doing. The top used to fall off these VDU's leaving you holding the display while the keyboard and main board fell to earth.
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What fun.........
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- author: Martin Ford (United Kingdom)
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date: Thursday 7th September 2017
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text: Would it be the same Gerry crisp who was sales manager at Mode in value if so he would remember me!!
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- author: Scott Parker (United Kingdom)
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date: Saturday 7th March 2015
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text: I worked at Cifer until they went bust. I am trying to track my pension contributions. Any ideas?
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- author: Stephen
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date: Saturday 24th January 2015
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text: I''ve just found one of these in amongst a load of rubbish complete with 8 inch disk drive!!!. I''t''s still got a few issues, such as the fact it trips the mains from time to time and the keyboard is unresponsive as yet, but I''ve got the massive disk drive up and running again and hope to fix the other parts with some advice. I have videos of the restoration on my YouTube channel, RetroGamerVX
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- author: Phil Gregory (UK)
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date: Friday 28th November 2014
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text: I worked in the test department in Melksham during my gap 2 years between School and Uni from 1980-82. We used to take each machine from production and test it which quite often involved explosions, electric shocks and fires! Faulty boards were fixed at a component level. our particular hatred was getting the picture square using rubber magnets and the picture in sharp focus! There were huge varieties of colours and key tops as each order was entirely custom made. There were white / green / orange phosphors and the orange were very soft focus. I forget the model number but there was a small screen all in one box machine with built in 5.25" floppies and eventually Winchester hard drives that was really neat. They also were the first company to port Unix to a 68000 and my Uni personal tutor worked with them to do this. This was reported in an issue of Computing magazine. I had a great time with a great bunch of guys and learnt to program there which has been my career for the last
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30 years!
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- author: Phil Gregory (UK)
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date: Friday 28th November 2014
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text: I worked in the test department in Melksham during my gap 2 years between School and Uni from 1980-82. We used to take each machine from production and test it which quite often involved explosions, electric shocks and fires! Faulty boards were fixed at a component level. our particular hatred was getting the picture square using rubber magnets and the picture in sharp focus! There were huge varieties of colours and key tops as each order was entirely custom made. There were white / green / orange phosphors and the orange were very soft focus. I forget the model number but there was a small screen all in one box machine with built in 5.25" floppies and eventually Winchester hard drives that was really neat. They also were the first company to port Unix to a 68000 and my Uni personal tutor worked with them to do this. This was reported in an issue of Computing magazine. I had a great time with a great bunch of guys and learnt to program there which has been my career for the last
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30 years!
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- author: Donna Oaten (was Mason) (Trowbridge)
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date: Wednesday 29th January 2014
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text: Just remembered the name of the young chap in the drawing office with me. It was Steve Pittard. Also recall Christine York from the Reception area and Dana/Daina from Reception. Would love some information regarding these people.
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- author: Donna Oaten (was Mason) (England)
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date: Wednesday 29th January 2014
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text: I worked at Cifer Systems until 1981 when I left to have my son, but continued to work from home for the company. I remember your grandfather. I worked as assistant to the Production Manager but unfortunately can''t recall his name, (Tony) he lived in Seend with his wife Val, who also worked at the company. I recall John Woolnough who was in charge of the girls/boys who produced the PCB''s. I worked in the design office and used to draw up the schematics. I remember working with the late Harry Harman and a young guy (then) called Steve (can''t recall his surname but it was quite unusual)
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- author: Paul Wright (Truro)
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date: Wednesday 24th August 2011
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text: Hi there!. Haven''t seen one of these for nearly 30 years! I used to work in the ''customisation'' department modifying the firmware to suite customer requirements. Didn''t have anything to do with the hardware side - sorry. Left in 1984 I think, have fond memories of the Z80 and CP/M with orange phosphor screens.
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- author: John G. Burns (UK)
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date: Monday 4th April 2011
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text: The Royal Observer Corps used these as terminals for our MSX message switch system. We probably had half a dozen in our bunker. There were custom big red and green buttons for send and receive (or cancel?) in the top right of the kb.
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- author: Mark Bennett (Kent)
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date: Wednesday 16th June 2010
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text: |-
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Hi there!
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I am VERY interested to contact anyone with Cifer Terminals (of any type) for the restoration of Home Office (c.1984) Message Exchange Switches (MSX-T and MSX-B). We have now located the last remainng original Home Office (F6) MSX equipment racks and are seeking to located CIFER Terminals (VDUs) and Technical knowledge / support on the few examples we already have. These units are to support the MSX''s we are restoring to full working condition in various museums in the UK. This work is non-profit and conducted entirely by enthusiasts. Can you help? Please!
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- author: Jorge Iribarren (Chile)
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date: Tuesday 29th April 2008
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text: |-
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Soy responsable del Departamento de Informatica de la Agencia UPI en Chile. Hasta el año 1999 se utilizó CIFER como sistema informatico para la entrega de noticias a nuestros clientes locales. Estas maquinas funcionaban bien, aunque el trato de las mismas no era el adecuado. Por ello estan un poco deterioradas. Nos quedaremos con sólo una de ellas. Por lo tanto me gustaria poder saber si les interesa la donacion de la que nos sobra. Necesita mantenimiento y restauracion.
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Sinceramente creo que es una maravilla que funcionaran hasta ese año. Sobre todo porque significaba un adelanto tecnico para la epoca del fax y los teletipos.
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Un abrazo, felicitaciónes por la iniciativa del Museo.
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Atte,
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Jorge Iribarren E.\
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jiribarren@upi.com\
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Santiago, Chile
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- author: Mark Bennett (Kent)
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date: Wednesday 2nd August 2006
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text: |-
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Hi, I am a researcher working to recreate a MSX system that used CIFER 2634 terminals. I am looking to contact anyone who could help with maintenance of the CIFER 26xx series and most importantly \*locate examples\* of 2634's for a historical restoration of national importance taking place with English Heritage, Acomb, York. We desparately need 2634's and TREND 800 Teleprinters.
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DO help if you can!
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oc_id: 1061
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source:
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url: https://web.archive.org/web/20230605030810/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=1061
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date: '2023-06-05'
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---
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The Cifer 2683 was the stand-alone version of a large range of dumb terminals released in the UK by the **Cifer Systems Limited** Company.
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The 2683 was actually a Z80 based 2632 terminal to which a second Z80 card has been added, providing 64 KB of user RAM and a floppy-disk controller. The machine was used as a Z80 software development or general purpose CP/M system. A ROM/EPROM card allowed to develop and run custom programs.
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A 300 x 1024 pixel graphics board was also available, including a third Z80A CPU and providing Tektronix 4010 compatibility.
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A **2684** was also released, with same features as the 2683 but including a built-in 5.25" floppy-disk drives instead of an external unit.
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---
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From **Ian Chard** (UK):\
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We had a couple of Cifer 2683s in our student flat about ten years ago. I'm not sure how much I can tell you, but I do remember that the keyboard was much more colourful than the one in your picture. The terminal's bell was a "meep", very high-pitched with soft edges.
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---
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**Ian Bishop**'s interesting memories:\
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I worked for Cifer as a field service engineer during the 80/90s. I had experience of working on all of their 'dumb' terminals through to their Unix 'fan heater' systems.\
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They had a number of large clients including the Countryside Commission and BLCMP (providing library services to Poly's and Uni's).\
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The BLCMP version of the 2600 series had a bar code pen attached to the keyboard. It had a seperate board within the keyboard that generated the bar code when the pen was scanned. This was fed to the keyboard port as if you had typed in the code. The pens were always breaking down because the originally used a filiment lamp as the light source. We fitted an upgrade using an white LED which made the far more reliable. The pen tips would wear out though. One version of the pen included a built in date stamp.. A library book issuer could scan a book to a student and date stamp for it's return all in on go !
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We were expected to repair to component level on-site. I dread to think what H&S rules were broken when we exposed the CRT on a library counter. Good times though - I did get sick of being taken for a library person at counters by often very rude students. What those staff had to put up with !!!
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Cifer also made the **9000 series** unix box. It didn't have any keyboard connections and you had to connect a terminal to make it go via a network ring adapter. Up until Cifer being sold off there were several engineers who could service these systems. I became one of the last and used to hold onto the rebuild system that contained all the software needed to rebuild a 9000. The filestore on the rebuild box contained a folder labelled Junta. This is where all the OS Kernals were stored !
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The main office/production was in Melksham. I joined the Northwich office - a samll industrial unit. We relocated to Eccles when we merged with another company.\
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I trained in Melksham workshop when I first joined. We used to receive systems from a sweet manufacturer. To ensure their systems got priority they used to package them in boxes filled with sweets !\
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Ah the good old days.....
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**Madeleine** adds:\
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Just to add to this Cifer remains live and well in Wilstire. These terminals are still in use, the 2600 series and indeed the T series, are still maintained on several sites and obviously last a lot longer than todays units!\
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The colourful keyboards mentionad by Ian Chard were used primarily for the library systems along with British Rail.
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