[GreenKeys] Combined file again. AP wire speeds

[Sheldon Daitch]

I can't speak for all states, but in North Carolina,
in the 1978-79 time frame, the AP radio wire was
running at 66/67 WPM.  Actually not only was the
radio wire at the speed, so was the slow speed
newspaper circuits, the 6 level Teletypesetter
circuits as well as the slow speed financial
wires (two circuits, since at the slow speed, it
took two parallel circuits to transfer the entire
financial data in time for the morning newspapers).

I think the baud rate on the six-level circuits was
slightly higher than that of the five-level circuit,
since, as best I remember, the gears were the same, the
main shaft ran at the same speed, but the six-level
machines had the one additional information pulse.

The AP in North Carolina had many M15 and M20 machines
across the state, with a handful of Extel printers.  The
service package gave the radio/TV wire subscriber a M15 but
if that subscriber wanted an Extel, they could get it at
extra cost.

I think the UPI radio service was ahead of the AP in
converting to newer equipment.  When I went to work for
a radio station in NC in 1976, they had a UPI Extel printer.

This reminds me of an interesting "feature" of some model
Extel RO printers.  Certain versions of the RO printer
used an electrical contact on the print mechanism to
make sure the print head was back at the left margin before it
would continue to print the next line.  If you held the
print head away from this left margin contact point, the
printer would not print anything but did store the output
data awaiting the print command.

The memory would store up to about two lines worth of text
and when the print head was released, hitting the left
margin contact, the Extel would print out all the stored
text at about 30% faster speed until it "caught" up with the
on-line incoming data, when it would resume printing at the
normal speed.

73
Sheldon


the problem appears to be the filter looks at a phrase
that I used instead of financial, to refer to the prices
of company shares.