The Altair 8800 Computer
The Start of the Personal Computer
Revolution
Stephen A. Edwards
April 11, 2018
1971: Intel’s 4004. The first single-chip processor. 4-bit
1972: Intel’s 8-bit 8008
By Konstantin Lanzet - CPU Collection Konstantin LanzetCamera: Canon EOS 400D, GFDL,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5694177
1974 Ford Pinto
Base price $2292
Consumer Guide’s Best Buy Subcompact of the Year
1974: Intel’s 8-bit 8080
Initial price: $360 Roughly $1900 in 2018
1974: Complete kit: $397; Assembled and tested: $498
Sold thousands: 2500 by May 1975; 5000 by August.
“Roberts was able to acquire the new and powerful Intel
8080 CPU for $75 each in large volume, when they normally
sold for over $300 each. These cosmetically blemished chips
worked just as well as the more expensive ones, and
allowed the Altair 8800 to be released at a very low price.”
—oldcomputers.net
Intel 8080 Block Diagram
Altair 8800 CPU Board
Power regulator, 2 MHz crystal, 8080 CPU, 8212 system
status latch
1K RAM Board
8 Intel 8101 256 × 4-bit static RAMs
Altair 8800 Front Panel
Altair 8800 with Terminal
1975: MITS ALTAIR BASIC
1964: BASIC language 10 Read about Altair in Popular Electronics
developed at Dartmouth 20 Contact MITS founder Ed Roberts
30 Offer to demo BASIC interpreter
40 Roberts agrees to meet
50 Write interpreter on Harvard’s PDP-10
60 Present (working) interpreter to Roberts
$150 (4K) or $200 (8K)
1975: MITS ALTAIR BASIC
1964: BASIC language 10 Read about Altair in Popular Electronics
developed at Dartmouth 20 Contact MITS founder Ed Roberts
30 Offer to demo BASIC interpreter
40 Roberts agrees to meet
50 Write interpreter on Harvard’s PDP-10
60 Present (working) interpreter to Roberts
$150 (4K) or $200 (8K)
—ALTAIR BASIC reference manual, 1975
The S-100 Bus
24 address lines (originally 16)
8 data-in lines
8 data-out lines
8 status lines
11 control lines
8 interrupt lines
8 DMA lines
16 “utility” lines
9 power lines (+8V, ±16V) Cromemco SCC, c. 1978
100 pins
Standardized as IEEE 696–1983
December 1975: The IMSAI 8080. Kit w/ 1K, $439
Cards (Byte, September 1976) Computers (January 1977)
Cromemco Systems and Processor Cards
Z-80 System Year Slots Floppies Hard Disk
Z-1 1976 21 - -
Z-2 1977 21 - -
System Two Z-2D 1978 21 2 × 5.25" -
System Three 1978 21 4 × 8" -
System Zero 1980 4 - -
System Two Z-2H 1980 12 2 × 5.25" 11 MB
System One CS-1 1981 8 2 × 5.25" -
System One CS-1H 1981 8 1 × 5.25" 5 MB
Card Year Processor Clock Whetstones
ZPU 1976 Z-80A 4 MHz 7,000
DPU 1982 Z-80A + MC68000 4 + 8 MHz 40,000
XPU 1984 Z-80B + MC68010 5 + 10 MHz 50,000
XXU 1986 MC68020 16.7 MHz 1,050,000
Source: Wikipedia
The CP/M Operating System
1974: Gary Kildall develops CP/M to run
on an Intel 8080 development board with
a 5.25" floppy
1976: Glenn Ewing approaches Kildall on
behalf of IMSAI to port CP/M to their
machines with floppies.
1977: IMSAI releases CP/M (DOS-A)
1980: IBM approaches Digital Research to
license CP/M for the forthcoming IBM PC.
Talks fail and IBM instead contracts with
Microsoft to produce MS-DOS.
Ultimately, CP/M sold over 250,000 copies
CP/M’s Greatest Hits
Many important commercial programs started on CP/M.
Programs very portable across CP/M machines (3,000
machine configurations)
Program Application
WordStar word processor
dBase II database
Zork text adventure
Turbo Pascal compiler
SuperCalc spreadsheet
AutoCAD computer-aided design
August 1981: The IBM PC (Intel 8088-based)
Altair-Duino
$150 from http://www.altairduino.com
Built with an Arduino Due
32-bit ARM Cortex M3 processor
84 MHz
96 KB RAM
512 KB Flash
Runs an 8080 emulator
SD card for storage
