It’s a special day today, 55 years ago IBM announced this model, along with other initial models of the System/360 family of computers, in April 1964. This particular model was first shipped to the Bank of America in August 1965.
Photo: IBM :: The S/360 was designed to replace IBM’s 1401 mainframe, which was popular but couldn’t be expanded or upgraded. Photo: IBM
IBM promised to begin delivering the first S/360 machines in the third quarter of 1965. Production problems emerged almost immediately. Photo: Mark Richards/Computer History Museum
Among the System/360’s 44 peripherals was the 2311 disk storage drive. Each removable disk pack stored 7.25 megabytes. Photo: Mark Richards/Computer History Museum
IBM spent US $5 billion to build the System/360, introduced in 1964. These 9-track magnetic tape drives were among the S/360’s 150-product line.
