Computers & Business Machines

Imagine the loss, 100 years from now, if museums hadn't begun preserving the artifacts of the computer age. The last few decades offer proof positive of why museums must collect continuously—to document technological and social transformations already underway.
The museum's collections contain mainframes, minicomputers, microcomputers, and handheld devices. Computers range from the pioneering ENIAC to microcomputers like the Altair and the Apple I. A Cray2 supercomputer is part of the collections, along with one of the towers of IBM's Deep Blue, the computer that defeated reigning champion Garry Kasparov in a chess match in 1997. Computer components and peripherals, games, software, manuals, and other documents are part of the collections. Some of the instruments of business include adding machines, calculators, typewriters, dictating machines, fax machines, cash registers, and photocopiers


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Franklin Ace 1200 Personal Computer
- Description
- The Franklin Ace 1200 was one of the Franklin Corporation models of Apple II clones made for sale in the United States. It was an upgrade of the Franklin 1000. It was compatible with Apple II computers, but could also run the CP/M operating system.
- The Franklin ACE 1200 had a MOS/Commodore 6502 microprocessor that ran at 1 MHz. It contained 48 KB of RAM and 16 KB of ROM and dual 5 ¼" floppy drives. The Ace 1200 came out between Apple II+ and the Apple //e. It included a CP/M card, a disk controller card, an 80 column card, and a dual serial/parallel card that was software interchangeable. The printer card caused problems because many applications did not recognize it.
- The Franklin Ace 1200 was introduced in 1983 for the price of $2,200. The Franklin series was ended after Franklin lost a legal battle with Apple.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1983
- maker
- Franklin Computer Corporation
- ID Number
- 2002.0157.01
- accession number
- 2002.0157
- catalog number
- 2002.0157.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History