The IBM 3101 ASCII Display Station, and IBM's subsequent products, the 3151/315X and 3161/316X, are display terminals with

asynchronous serial communication Asynchronous serial communication is a form of serial communication in which the communicating endpoints' interfaces are not continuously synchronized by a common clock signal. Instead of a common synchronization signal, the data stream contai ...

(start-stop signaling) that were used with a variety of IBM and non-IBM computers during the 1980s–90s, especially the data processing terminals on non-IBM

minicomputer A minicomputer, or colloquially mini, is a class of smaller general purpose computers that developed in the mid-1960s and sold at a much lower price than mainframe and mid-size computers from IBM and its direct competitors. In a 1970 survey, ...

IBM Series/1 The IBM Series/1 is a 16-bit minicomputer, introduced in 1976, that in many respects competed with other minicomputers of the time, such as the PDP-11 from Digital Equipment Corporation and similar offerings from Data General and HP. The Se ...

and

IBM AIX AIX (Advanced Interactive eXecutive, pronounced , "ay-eye-ex") is a series of Proprietary software, proprietary Unix operating systems developed and sold by IBM for several of its computer platforms. Background Originally released for the ...

computers. IBM-3101

Models

IBM 3101

The IBM 3101 ASCII Display Station appeared in 1979. It featured: * 12-inch green-phosphor CRT display * 24 lines of 80 characters * ASCII Keyboard (US English, Belgian, Danish, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese Katakana, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, Swiss French, Swiss German, UK English) * Asynchronous communication: EIA

RS-232C In telecommunications, RS-232 or Recommended Standard 232 is a standard originally introduced in 1960 for serial communication transmission of data. It formally defines signals connecting between a ''DTE'' (''data terminal equipment'') such ...

interface for short distance; EIA

RS-422 RS-422, also known as TIA/EIA-422, is a technical standard originated by the Electronic Industries Alliance that specifies electrical characteristics of a digital signaling circuit. It was meant to be the foundation of a suite of standards that ...

interface for longer distance * Baud rates of 200/300 to 19,200 (bps) Unusually for IBM's practices at the time, it also: * Utilized various non-IBM technologies * Required initial setup by the user * Consisted of various types of displays, keyboards and logic * Was serviced at IBM service depots only * Allowed user-performed diagnostics, via the Problem Determination Guide booklet stored in the keyboard * Could be purchased (with volume discounts) but not leased The IBM 3101 was used with a variety of IBM and non-IBM computers. As an asynchronous communication display, it competed with products from

Digital Equipment Corporation Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC ), using the trademark Digital, was a major American company in the computer industry from the 1960s to the 1990s. The company was co-founded by Ken Olsen and Harlan Anderson in 1957. Olsen was president unt ...

(e.g.

VT100 The VT100 is a video terminal, introduced in August 1978 by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC). It was one of the first terminals to support ANSI escape codes for cursor control and other tasks, and added a number of extended codes for special f ...

Wyse Technology WYSE (970 AM) is a radio station located in Canton, North Carolina, that simulcasts WISE's sports format from Asheville, North Carolina. Owned by the Asheville Radio Group subsidiary of Saga Communications, the station is licensed by the Fede ...

(e.g. 50/60/70),

Applied Digital Data Systems Applied Digital Data Systems (ADDS) was a supplier of video display computer terminals, founded in 1969 by Leeam Lowin and William J. Catacosinos. Lowin simultaneously founded Solid State Data Sciences (SSDS). SSDS was one of the first developers ...

(e.g. ADDS Viewpoint) and others. It was often used as a data processing terminal on non-IBM

minicomputers A minicomputer, or colloquially mini, is a class of smaller general purpose computers that developed in the mid-1960s and sold at a much lower price than mainframe and mid-size computers from IBM and its direct competitors. In a 1970 survey, ...

and the

IBM 3102 printer

The IBM 3102 dot-matrix printer used thermal-paper print technology, and could be attached to the IBM 3101's auxiliary port. It supported 80 5x7 dot-matrix characters per line, 6 lines per inch, and output 40 characters per second.

IBM 3161/3163

The IBM 3161/3163 ASCII Display Stations became available in 1985 and featured: * Monochrome 12-inch (3161) or 14-inch (3163) CRT displays * Optional cards to emulate other ASCII display terminals:

ADDS Applied Digital Data Systems (ADDS) was a supplier of video display computer terminals, founded in 1969 by Leeam Lowin and William J. Catacosinos. Lowin simultaneously founded Solid State Data Sciences (SSDS). SSDS was one of the first developers ...

Viewpoint, Hazeltine 1500,

Lear Siegler Lear Siegler Incorporated (LSI) is a diverse American corporation established in 1962. Its products range from car seats and brakes to weapons control systems for military fighter planes. The company's more than $2 billion-a-year annual sales come ...

ADM-3A The ADM-3A was an influential early video display terminal, introduced in 1976. It was manufactured by Lear Siegler and had a 12-inch screen displaying 12 or 24 lines of 80 characters. It set a new industry low single unit price of $995. Its "du ...

and ADM 5, and

TeleVideo TeleVideo Corporation was a U.S. company that achieved its peak of success in the early 1980s producing computer terminals. TeleVideo was founded in 1975 by K. Philip Hwang, a Utah State University, Hanyang University graduate born in South Kore ...

910

IBM 3164

The IBM 3164 Color ASCII Display Station, available in 1986, featured a 14-inch green, amber or white monochrome CRT display.

IBM 3151

The IBM 3151 ASCII Display Station became available in 1987, and included: * 14-inch diagonal green, amber or white CRT display * 24 lines of 80-132 characters each * Display/logic and keyboard * Optional emulation of other Lear Siegler ADM-3A, ADM-5, ADDS Viewpoint A2, Hazeltine 1500, Televideo TVI-910/910+, TVI-912, TVI-920, TVI-925, TVI-925E, and IBM 3101 ASCII display terminals. * ASCII block operating mode (except models 51 and 61, which were similar to the

EBCDIC Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code (EBCDIC; ) is an eight-bit character encoding used mainly on IBM mainframe and IBM midrange computer operating systems. It descended from the code used with punched cards and the corresponding six- ...

IBM 3270 The IBM 3270 is a family of block oriented display and printer computer terminals introduced by IBM in 1971 and normally used to communicate with IBM mainframes. The 3270 was the successor to the IBM 2260 display terminal. Due to the text ...

). In 1988, the 3151 won IBM's Japan subsidiary a Good Design Product Award from the

Japan Institute of Design Promotion The is a Japanese design institution. Originally called the Japan Industrial Design Promotion Organization, it was founded in 1969 with the goal of promoting industrial design Industrial design is a process of design applied to physical produ ...

.1988 "Good Design Product" Award for IBM 3151 Computer Terminal (IBM Japan）
(in Japanese)

IBM 3152

The IBM 3152 Color ASCII Display Station became available in 1992 in European, Middle Eastern and African countries. It included: * ASCII keyboard (US English, Belgian, Danish, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Greek, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, Swiss French, Swiss German, or UK English) * PS/2 keyboard (US English, Belgian, Bosnian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Greek, Hungarian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Rumanian, Russian, Slovak, Slv/Croat/Sl, Spanish, Swedish, Swiss French, Swiss German, Turkish F, Turkish Q, Hebrew, or UK English)

IBM 3153

The IBM 3153 InfoWindow II Color ASCII Display Station became available in 1993. Similarly to the NCR (

Boundless Technologies SunRiver Data Systems was a division of SunRiver Corporation, a private company founded in 1986 in Jackson, Mississippi by four electrical engineers (Ronnie Hughes, Bill Long, Kester Rice, and Gerald Youngblood), all former employees of Diversi ...

) 2900 series of terminals, it could be used with cash registers and kitchen monitor systems.

Development, manufacturing and users

The IBM 3101/315x/316x Series were developed by IBM's Communication Products development laboratories in Fujisawa and

Yamato was originally the area around today's Sakurai City in Nara Prefecture of Japan, which became Yamato Province and by extension a name for the whole of Japan. Yamato is also the dynastic name of the ruling Imperial House of Japan. Japanese his ...

, Japan; then later by IBM's development department in

Greenock Greenock (; sco, Greenock; gd, Grianaig, ) is a town and administrative centre in the Inverclyde council areas of Scotland, council area in Scotland, United Kingdom and a former burgh of barony, burgh within the Counties of Scotland, historic ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

. They were manufactured at IBM's

Research Triangle Park Research Triangle Park (RTP) is the largest research park in the United States, occupying in North Carolina and hosting more than 300 companies and 65,000 workers. The facility is named for its location relative to the three surrounding cities ...

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...

, USA, for the Americas and Asia/Pacific; and in Greenock for other countries. They were used as data processing input/output terminals on many

—especially the IBM Series/1 and IBM AIX—for commercial, government and military applications.

Legacy

The 31** series formed the basis of other several other low-cost IBM display stations, including the 3104 for the

IBM 8100 The IBM 8100 Information System, announced Oct. 3, 1978, was at one time IBM’s principal distributed processing engine, providing local processing capability under two incompatible operating systems ( DPPX and DPCX) and was a follow-on to the ...

; the 5291 in the

IBM 5250 IBM 5250 is a family of block-oriented terminals originally introduced with the IBM System/34 midrange computer systems in 1977. It also connects to the later System/36, System/38, and IBM AS/400 systems, and to IBM Power Systems systems running I ...

display terminal series for the

IBM System/36 The IBM System/36 (often abbreviated as S/36) was a midrange computer marketed by IBM from 1983 to 2000 - a multi-user, multi-tasking successor to the System/34. Like the System/34 and the older System/32, the System/36 was primarily progr ...

; the 4980 display for the

; and the 3178 display in the