IBM 1400 series

An IBM 7040 installation that used an IBM 1401 for I/O support. The 1401 is partially shown at the far lower right, with a 1402 card reader/punch behind it. An IBM 1403 printer is in the front center of the picture.

The IBM 1400 series were second generation (transistorized) mid-range business computers that IBM sold in the early 1960s. They could be operated as an independent systems, in conjunction with IBM punched card equipment, or as auxiliary equipment to other computer systems.

1400-series machines stored information in magnetic cores as variable length character strings terminated by a special flag. Arithmetic was performed character-by-character. Input and output was on punch card, magnetic tape and high speed line printers. Disk storage was also available.