1401S, 1470 "last gasp" computers 493

Tim Shoppa

I think the differences were that the 1401-S and 1470 would've been direct compebreastion to S-360 models 30 and 40 which they didn't want. They wanted the 14xx users to dump those machines and get S-360. Once they figured out they could use microcode for efficient emulation, there was no reason to retain 14xx. (Many people retained emulation for YEARS, I wonder if any still run or the last run. We dumped our last around 1992).

IIRC, the Pugh book mentions the 1130 only in pbutting and doesn't provide much detail. (IBM's website has an exhibit right now on the 1130, BTW).

In a sense, it seems the 1130 was kind of S-360-model 20 for scientific users, but totally not compatible. Perhaps being a scientific machine it was more "under the radar" than if a business machine.

I also don't understand is how anynoe found time to develop software and hardware for the 1130 in those days. The impression was that S-360 was killing everyone in IBM-- they had trouble making the SLT chips pushing deliveries behind and the software was a total disaster. They had problems supporting existing "temporizing" products to tide people over because people were pulled over to S-360.