Robotron K 1840
Encyclopedia
Minicomputer
A minicomputer is a class of multi-user computers that lies in the middle range of the computing spectrum, in between the largest multi-user systems and the smallest single-user systems...
from the German Democratic Republic
German Democratic Republic
The German Democratic Republic , informally called East Germany by West Germany and other countries, was a socialist state established in 1949 in the Soviet zone of occupied Germany, including East Berlin of the Allied-occupied capital city...
(GDR). Its full name is "RVS K 1840" (RVS stands for Rechnersystem mit virtuellem Speicher – "computer system with virtual memory"). Its development began in August 1985 at VEB
Volkseigener Betrieb
The Volkseigener Betrieb was the legal form of industrial enterprise in East Germany...
Robotron Elektronik
Robotron
VEB Kombinat Robotron was the biggest East German electronics manufacturer. It was based in Dresden and employed 68,000 people . It produced personal computers, SM EVM minicomputers, the ESER mainframe computers, several computer peripherals as well as home computers, radios and television...
in Dresden, and it went into production in 1988.
The K 1840 minicomputer was a clone of VAX-11/780
VAX-11
The VAX-11 was a family of minicomputers developed and manufactured by Digital Equipment Corporation using processors implementing the VAX instruction set architecture . The VAX-11/780 was the first VAX computer.- VAX-11/780 :...
from Digital Equipment Corporation
Digital Equipment Corporation
Digital Equipment Corporation was a major American company in the computer industry and a leading vendor of computer systems, software and peripherals from the 1960s to the 1990s...
(DEC). The export of western 32-bit
32-bit
The range of integer values that can be stored in 32 bits is 0 through 4,294,967,295. Hence, a processor with 32-bit memory addresses can directly access 4 GB of byte-addressable memory....
minicomputers to Comecon
Comecon
The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance , 1949–1991, was an economic organisation under hegemony of Soviet Union comprising the countries of the Eastern Bloc along with a number of communist states elsewhere in the world...
countries was forbidden by the CoCom
CoCom
CoCom is an acronym for Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls. CoCom was established by Western bloc powers in the first five years after the end of World War II, during the Cold War, to put an arms embargo on COMECON countries.CoCom ceased to function on March 31, 1994, and the...
technology embargo. Therefore one had to be developed locally, using computer Aided Design technology based on a 32-bit computer architecture
Computer architecture
In computer science and engineering, computer architecture is the practical art of selecting and interconnecting hardware components to create computers that meet functional, performance and cost goals and the formal modelling of those systems....
.
The K 1840 was the first 32-bit computer of the M 32 VAX-compatible minicomputer line. Copies of VAX-11/7xx computers are known also from Czechoslovakia (CM 5152), Hungary (TPA-11/540, 560 and 580), Romania (CORAL 8730) and the Soviet Union (CM 1700).
K 1840 had a maximum computing speed of 1.1 MIPS; it could access up to 16 MB of main memory and up to 4 GB of virtual memory.
The first prototype with the essential core components was introduced in April 1987, and five more were built from then until September 1987. The new computer was presented to the public in October 1987. In 1988 it was awarded the National Prize of the GDR
National Prize of East Germany
The National Prize of the German Democratic Republic was an award of the German Democratic Republic given out in three different classes for scientific, artistic, and other meritorious achievement...
, 1st class, and a gold medal at the Leipzig spring fair
Leipzig Trade Fair
The Leipzig Trade Fair was a major fair for trade across Central Europe for nearly a millennium. After the Second World War, its location happened to lie within the borders of East Germany, whereupon it became one of the most important trade fairs of Comecon and was traditionally a meeting place...
. Production started in June 1988 and 217 machines were delivered at a price of 1.9 million Mark
East German mark
The East German mark commonly called the eastern mark , in East Germany only Mark, was the currency of the German Democratic Republic . Its ISO 4217 currency code was DDM...
up to 1990.
While the K 1840 was under development, its successor (the K 1845, based on the VAX 11/785) had already been conceived. The K 1845 was presented to the public at the Leipzig spring fair in 1990. It had a bigger main storage capacity (up to 64 MB) and could handle a bigger number of bus adaptors and controllers than its predecessor. Twenty prototypes were built.
A further successor was contemplated: the K 1850, with a performance of 6 MIPS, using ECL
Emitter-coupled logic
In electronics, emitter-coupled logic , is a logic family that achieves high speed by using an overdriven BJT differential amplifier with single-ended input, whose emitter current is limited to avoid the slow saturation region of transistor operation....
gate arrays.
Robotron developed a copy of the MicroVAX
MicroVAX
The MicroVAX was a family of low-end minicomputers developed and manufactured by Digital Equipment Corporation . The first model, the MicroVAX I, was introduced in 1984...
II called the K 1820
Robotron K 1820
The K 1820 was a workstation developed in East Germany. Its more exact name was "RVS K 1820" and it's cipher in the SM EVM of the former COMECON countries was "SM 1720"...
, which reached approximately 90% of the performance of the K 1840. The K 1820 was fully compatible with the software of the K 1840, so that already-developed system and application software could be used.
In mid-1990, production of the K 1840 and K 1845 and all development work stopped, because economical production was not feasible under free-market conditions resulting from the currency, economic and social union of East and West Germany on 1 July 1990, causing the collapse of Robotron's traditional markets in the Soviet Union and East Europe.
There are K 1840s in the Technische Sammlungen Museum in Dresden, in the Konrad-Zuse-Computermusuem in Hoyerswerda
Hoyerswerda
Hoyerswerda is the largest city in the district of Bautzen in the German state of Saxony. It is located in Lusatia, a region where many people speak the Sorbian languages in addition to German.-Geography:...
and in the Computer History Museum
Computer History Museum
The Computer History Museum is a museum established in 1996 in Mountain View, California, USA. The Museum is dedicated to preserving and presenting the stories and artifacts of the information age, and exploring the computing revolution and its impact on our lives.-History:The museum's origins...
in Mountain View, California
Mountain View, California
-Downtown:Mountain View has a pedestrian-friendly downtown centered on Castro Street. The downtown area consists of the seven blocks of Castro Street from the Downtown Mountain View Station transit center in the north to the intersection with El Camino Real in the south...
, USA.