TWIN documentation

The ECA system did not come with any documentation, unfortunately.

The HM system came with a box full of hard-copy documentation, the most relevant parts of which are now digitised and preserved, as indicated by the hyperlinks below. If you are interested in a document that has not been digitized yet, then drop me a note (see the link at the bottom of this page).

Disks HM19 to HM22 contain the EXOS disk operating system. EXOS includes a typesetting program and documentation on EXOS itself, the relocatable assembler, macro processor and the typesetting language. PDFs can be found below.

I have a small collection of documentation with items that I have not found elsewhere. See the Personal collection section below.

On bitsavers.org you can find a collection of documentation for the Tektronix 8002/8002A. This includes an Operator’s Guide and Hardware Reference Manual for the Millennium Universal One, and several sales brochures for the 8002 and Universal One.

There is also a TekWiki, a wiki on Tektronix, which has a nice section on the 8001, 8002 and 8002A sister machines.

All documents are in English, unless otherwise noted.

From the HM collection

This collection contains a large number of documents. Some are official Signetics manuals, while other appear to be internal memos or support bulletins. Of particular interest is a series of TWIN technical notes.

Manuals

Manual – Signetics TWIN Operator’s Guide, SDOS 2.0. Document number TW09003000, 1976, Signetics, approx. 150 pages.

Manual – Signetics TWIN Operator’s Guide, SDOS 3.0. Document number TW09003000. 1979-01-03 total revision to SDOS 3.0; 1980-01-06 corrections. Approx. 150 pages.

Manual – Signetics TWIN testware instrument System Reference. Document number TW09004000. October 1976, Signetics, approx. 130 pages.

Manual – Signetics TWIN high speed master/slave memory, supplement to reference manual. Document number TW140000012. 1979, 12 pages + 3 pages.

Manual errata – Slave 2650A supplement, Revision A. 1 page.
replaces page 17.

Manual – Signetics TWIN Real Time Hardware Analyzer, supplement to operator’s guide. Document number TW14000013. 1979, 17 pages + 3 pages.

Manual – Signetics TWIN real time hardware analyzer, supplement to reference manual. Document number TW140000019. 1979, 35 pages + 3 pages.

Manual – Signetics TWIN Testware Instrument 2650 Assembly Language. Document number TW09005000. May 1976, Signetics, 40 pages.

Manual – Signetics TWIN 2650 Relocatable Assembler Manual. 1979-01-15 initial version, 1979-04-01 Revision A, Signetics, 90 pages + 7 pages.

Manual – 2650 PASCAL. N.V. Philips Natuurkundig Laboratorium (Natlab).
Bundle contains three documents and a disk listing:

Implementation of Pascal on 2650 systems. 1981-01-07, 17 pages.
Description of TWIN Pascal. Unknown date, 13 pages.
TWIN Pascal compiler. 1981-01-22, 23 pages.
TWIN Pascal disk listing, 1981-01-12.

2650 Reference Guide. November 1978.
Fold-out pocket reference cards.

Manual – 2650 Microprocessor User’s Manual (update 3). Unknown date, Signetics, 12 pages.

Manual – Signetics 2650 Microprocessor Hardware Specifications. April 1975, Signetics, 136 pages.

Manual – Signetics 2650 Microprocessor Assembler Language. April 1975, Signetics, 44 pages.

Manual – Signetics 2650 Microprocessor Software Simulator. April 1975, Signetics, 36 pages.

Manual – Signetics 2650 Microprocessor System Application Notes.
A bundle of well-known application notes. Many copies can be found online, for example at Emerson Arcadia 2001 Central.
AS50 – Serial Input/Output
AS51 – Bit and Byte testing procedues
AS52 – General delay routines
AS53 – Binary arithmetic routines
AS54 – Conversion routines
AS55 – Fixed point decimal arithmetic routines
MP53 – Address and data bus interfacing techniques
MP54 – 2650 input/output structures and interfaces
SP50 – 2650 evaluation printed circuit board level system (PC1001), 2 copies
SP53 – Simulator, version 1.2
SP54 – Support software for use with GE’s Mark III timesharing system
SP55 – The ABC Adaptable Board Computer
SS50 – PIPBUG
SS51 – Absolute Object Format
SS51 – Absolute Object Format, revision 1
MP51 – 2650 initialisation
MP52 – Low cost clock generator circuits

Technical Note 094 – 2650 BCD floating point routines. 1987-08-31, Philips / Signetics, 15 pages.

TWIN technical notes series

TWIN Technical Note General. GN001. 1976-10-26, 1 page.
Announcing technical notes, general / hardware / software.

TWIN Technical Note General. GN002. 1976-12-13, 1 page.
Update TWIN Operators Guide, errata sheets for SDOS version 2.0

TWIN Technical Note General. GN003. Unknown date, 3 pages.
Announcing new products for TWIN.

TWIN Technical Note General. GN004. 1979-11-23, 1 page.
SDOS 4.0 and memory mapping.

TWIN Technical Note General. GN005. Unknown date, 2 pages.
Disk errors, how to work around errors in source files.

TWIN Technical Note General. GN006. 1980-07-16, 1 page.
SDOS 4.0 manual updates, replacement pages with corrections marked.

TWIN Technical Note General. GN007. 1982-06-29, 3 pages.
Announcing availability of Basic and Pascal languages.

TWIN Technical Note Hardware. HW001. 1977-03-21, 1 page.
Corrections to handling the Sense and Flag lines when tracing.

TWIN Technical Note Hardware. HW002. Unknown date, 2 pages.
Setting terminal jumpers for automatic scrolling.

TWIN Technical Note Hardware. HW003. 1979-01-12, 24 pages.
Modifications and software for programming EPROMS 2704/8 and 2716.

TWIN Technical Note Hardware. HW003A. 1979-05-16, 1 page.
Corrections to HW003.

TWIN Technical Note Hardware. HW004. 1980-01-25, 1 page.
Noise immunity with new slave card 2650A.

TWIN Technical Note Hardware. HW005. 1980-08-21, 1 page.
Corrections to handling the Sense and Flag lines when tracing with new slave card 2650A.

TWIN Technical Note Hardware. HW006. 1980-08-21, 1 page.
Baud rate Master CPU PCB, set to 2400.

TWIN Technical Note Hardware. HW007. 1980-11-03, 3 pages.
Hang-ups when using SDOS 4.0.

TWIN Technical Note Hardware. HW008. 1982-03-12, 11 pages.
Modifications and software for programming 2732 and 2732A EPROMs.

TWIN Technical Note Hardware. HW009. 1982-04-08, 5 pages.
Adding a second line printer.

TWIN Technical Note Software. SW002 (supersedes SW001). 1976-11-29, 9 pages.
SDOS 2.0, changes since SDOS 1.0.

TWIN Technical Note Software. SW003. 1976-12-13, 1 page.
Assembling large programs.

TWIN Technical Note Software. SW004. 1977-01-17, 2 pages.
Adding HSPT reader Digitronics 2540.

TWIN Technical Note Software. SW005. 1979-02-14, 30 pages.
8048 Assembler on TWIN.

TWIN Technical Note Software. SW006. 1979-02-19, 3 pages.
Generate Intel format object code.

TWIN Technical Note Software. SW007. 1979-02-22, 1 page.
Recovering files after malfunctions during editing.

TWIN Technical Note Software. SW008. 1980-02-07, 1 page.
Rubout function and SDOS 4.0 (for Minibee II terminal).

TWIN Technical Note Software. SW008A. 1980-07-16, 3 pages.
Rubout function and Correction to SW008.

TWIN Technical Note Software. SW009. 1980-08-18, 5 pages.
Data communications between TWIN and PMDS (Philips Microcomputer Development System).

Memos and bulletins

Internal Memo – Service of TWIN-system. 1982-07-09; 1 page.
Change in service and maintenance activities of TWIN-systems.

Attachment: list of spare parts.1980-09-01, 2 pages.
12NC numbers for TWIN spare parts.
Attachment: TWIN Technical Note General. GN007. 1982-06-29, 3 pages.
Announcing availability of Basic and Pascal languages.

Internal Memo – Service of TWIN-system. 1982-07-09, 1 page.
Change in service and maintenance activities of TWIN-systems

Internal Memo – TWIN Service. 1979-09-20, 1 page.
TWIN with serial #177 maintenance contract; 2 copies.

Circular Letter. 1979-08-03, 5 pages.
TWIN service options and repair price list.

Circular Letter – IC Newsletter. 1978-08-30, 1 page.
Shipments of first Instructor 50 units.

Circular Letter – IC Newsletter. 1978-04-21, 3 pages.
Assembler for 8X300 on IBM/370 computer.

Circular Letter. 1977-08-26, 1 page.
Announcing availability of two new IO cables.

Circular Letter – IC Newsletter. 1977-06-07, 5 pages.
Preliminary specifications of what would become the Instructor 50

Circular Letter – IC Newsletter. 1977-04-14, 2 pages.
Information on in-house training courses.

Circular Letter – IC Newsletter. 1977-02-15, 5 pages.
Corrections to Circular Letter of 1977-01-10

Circular Letter – procedures to access the 2650 and 8X300 microprocessor support programs. 1977-01-10, 19 pages.
Information on using the in-house IBM/370 computer.

Circular Letter, 1976-08-20, 2 pages.
Instructions on making BPNF tapes for PROM programming.

EXOS documentation

The EXOS operating system includes a typesetting program, invoked by the TXT command. TXT allows the creating of manuals, and supports automatic numbering of sections and subsections, numbered and unnumbered lists, tabbing, flexible margins and other typesetting features. What is interesting is that the TWIN terminal only supports uppercase letters, yet TXT supports the creating of manuals in proper lower and upper case.

Text Editing Program. Definition of the TXT typesetting language.

TWIN 2650 Assembler And Link Editor. Documentation of a relocatable assembler. I have not checked whether this is different from the Signetics relocatable assembler.

Macro-instructions. Documentation on the assembler macro processor.

TWIN Operating System. Documentation on the EXOS operating system. A lot of this applies to the other TWIN operating systems as well.

I created the documents from the files on the HM20 disk using a Perl-script that mimics the TXT command. You can find this script on the Utilities page.

Personal collection

In the early 1980’s I collected some documentation on the 2650. It contained well-known documents from the Signetics/Philips ASxx, SPxx, MPxx series, but also some document that I have not found elsewhere.

Laboratory report EDP 7612: Logarithmic routine for the 2650 microprocessor. 6-1-1977, Philips, 17 pages. Note: this is a scan of a poor photocopy and the code listing is only just readable.

AS57 – Signetics 2650 binary floating point routines. Feb 1977, Signetics, 14 pages.

TN086 – Introducing the Signetics 2655 PPI. 29-5-1978, Philips, 8 pages.

SP55 – The ABC adaptable board computer. March 1977, Philips, 14 pages.