website/content/museum/terak-corporation-8510-data-processor.md

title, categories, types, origins, years, cpus, params

title	categories	types	origins	years	cpus	params
Terak Corporation 8510 Data Processor	Computers	Professional Computer	U.S.A.	1976	16-bit DEC LSI-11	name image company company_name specs tabs photos adverts emulators links oc_id source 8510 Data Processor /media/museum/photos/terak_8510a_1s.jpg /companies/terak-corporation Terak Corporation label value NAME 8510 Data Processor label value MANUFACTURER Terak Corporation label value TYPE Professional Computer label value ORIGIN U.S.A. label value YEAR august 1976 label value CPU 16-bit DEC LSI-11/2 (EIS/FIS) or optional DEC LSI-11/23 (MMU/EIS/FPP) label value RAM 64 KB (LSI-11/2), 128KB (LSI-11/23), expandable to 256 KB label value TEXT MODES 24x80 label value GRAPHIC MODES 320x240 label value COLORS Black & White display label value SOUND Yess label value SIZE / WEIGHT 31 cm (W) x 19cm (H) x 46cm (D) / 20.6 Kg label value I/O PORTS 4 x RS232C serial ports label value BUILT IN MEDIA 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 value PRICE $7850 (USA, 1978) photos adverts emulators links title subtitle text image 8510A MODEL as pictured in the official commercial documentation Thanks to [Bitsavers](http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/) for this picture. /media/museum/photos/terak_8510a_1.jpg title subtitle text image 8510 DATA PROCESSOR The unit itself, sold as the 8510 Data Processor Thanks to [www.computerhistory.org](https://www.computerhistory.org/) for this picture. null title subtitle text image BACK FOR THE SYSTEM Thanks to [www.computerhistory.org](https://www.computerhistory.org/) for this picture. /media/museum/photos/terak_8510_back_1.jpg title subtitle text image REAR CONNECTORS /media/museum/photos/terak_8510_back_2.jpg title subtitle text image SOME EXAMPLES OF BITMAP PICTURES generated by the Terak 8510a at the end of the 70s !! Quite impressive. Thanks to http://www.threedee.com/jcm/terak/ for these images /media/museum/photos/terak_8510_graf_surface_1.jpg title subtitle text image TERAK 8510A BROCHURE - PAGE 1 /media/museum/pubs/terak_8510a_brochure_1.jpg title subtitle text image TERAK 8510A BROCHURE - PAGE 2 /media/museum/pubs/terak_8510a_brochure_2.jpg title subtitle text image TERAK 8510A BROCHURE - PAGE 3 /media/museum/pubs/terak_8510a_brochure_3.jpg title subtitle text image TERAK 8510A BROCHURE - PAGE 4 /media/museum/pubs/terak_8510a_brochure_4.jpg title url platform text bk-terak-emu https://sourceforge.net/projects/bk-terak-emu/ Unix / Linux Elektronika BK-0010, Elektronika BK-0011M and Terak 8510/a (preliminary) emulator for Linux title url text Bitsavers http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/terak/ Bitsavers.org has a lot of Terak documentations title url text Mark Riordan's home page! http://www.60bits.net/msu/mycomp/terak/terframe.htm Some info about the Terak systems here title url text The Terak Museum http://www.threedee.com/jcm/terak/ Some valuable infos about the Terak systems including amazing screenshots 1314 url date https://web.archive.org/web/20230601215344/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=1314 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.