The IBM 1627 Plotter

The IBM 1130 was aimed at technical and scientific users. One of its available peripherals, therefore, was a plotter: the IBM 1627 Plotter (from the 1130's "personal computing" predecessor, the IBM 1620 System). In a departure from IBM's usual practice, the 1627 was second-sourced from CalComp.

The 1627 was single-pen, pin-fed plotter with a minimum increment size of 0.01 inch. It was available in two models: the Model 1's maximum plot size was 11 inches by 120 feet, and it could perform up to 300 steps/second; the Model 2's maximum plot size was 29.5 inches by 120 feet and it could perform up to 200 steps/second.

As with much of the 1130 System's hardware, managing the 1627 was processor intensive. Each word sent to it could cause only one step in any of eight directions, plus an optional pen raise or lower; the 1627 accepted no further commands until the first was completed.