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Vintage Word Processors

arkycomp

New Member
Joined
Jun 23, 2021
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I was just looking through an awesome thread on a Lanier word processor restoration earlier and was wondering if anyone else has pics of interesting machines. I just bought a Brother WP-75 on a whim and can't seem to get disks to recognize, perhaps the drive is dead. Regardless, I love that wide amber screen it comes with and daisy wheel printing is pretty crisp. Unknown.jpeg
 
I believe that the WP-75 uses single-sided DD floppies that use a GCR format to store 240KB. They're not readable/writable on a normal PC. I don't know if that's your problem or not. I think I recall that this model uses belt-drive floppies, so the problem may also be that the belts have gone pinin' for the fjords.

You want a real vintage word processor, how about an Artec? 8" drives, 8080 CPU with a Diablo Hitype KSR and a one-line LCD display.
 
Interesting, maybe I'll see if there are any single-sided DD floppies available somewhere. It sounds like it is spinning but I wouldn't be surprised if I had to pull the drive and have a look. As for that Artec, it sounds cool, but the reason I love this WP-75 is that warm CRT monitor! A one-line LCD would drive me nuts haha!
 
You want a real vintage word processor, how about an Artec? 8" drives, 8080 CPU with a Diablo Hitype KSR and a one-line LCD display.

Back when I was a teenager I dumpster-dived a top-of-the-line Exxon Qyx(tm): The Intelligent Typewriter, which sounds like it's somewhere around the same level. (Link is to a simple one-page brochure, there's almost nothing out there about these things.) Unfortunately the disk drives (or media, I had couple boxes of unreadable disks) were stone dead so fiddling mostly consisted of writing one or two page nonsense short stories on it once in a while until it decided it wasn't going to power up anymore after a few months. It had an LED-based 24 character display and hard-sector 5 1/4" disk drives, I'd love to know what CPU was running the show inside.
 
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Hard to say--this was at a time when Exxon was flush with cash (the OPEC embargo drove oil prices up dramatically) and was looking for something to do with it. They purchased Zilog, Qyx, Qwip (FAX machine maker) in a buying frenzy around 1980. In Zilog's case, they pretty much strangled development by giving Zilog too much money; lots of projects erupted with no focus. Eventually Exxon sold the company back to an employee-VC consortium. Exxon really hurt Zilog.
 
I remember at the time being really confused about the Exxon branding on a fancy typewriter/word processor. It's pretty astounding just what a debacle the whole Exxon Office Systems affair was, I guess.

It's been too long ago so I can't say for sure if I ever tried to pull the thing apart and see what was inside. It's what I'd normally do when something breaks (and I'm sure I would have at least wanted to try to clean/fix the disk drives), but I have vague memories of the thing being extremely difficult to take apart without either the manual or a sledgehammer. It also weighed a few metric tonnes.
 
Hi guys

Is there still interest for these Brother word processors in the vintage computer community? I picked one up (because I can't let things with small CRTs in it go to waste...) with an iffy brightness wheel and it sounds like the floppy drive belt is broken, but the condition is otherwise fair.

Does it need scans of manuals, disk images, ROM dumps etc. or are these not interesting enough to be documented? The date codes say year 1990 and the PCB is fairly "modern". Would it be possible to run other programs/OSes?

It also looks like it's using those brother daisy wheels cartridges that I have a few of from a printer.
 
Hi guys

Is there still interest for these Brother word processors in the vintage computer community? I picked one up (because I can't let things with small CRTs in it go to waste...) with an iffy brightness wheel and it sounds like the floppy drive belt is broken, but the condition is otherwise fair.

Does it need scans of manuals, disk images, ROM dumps etc. or are these not interesting enough to be documented? The date codes say year 1990 and the PCB is fairly "modern". Would it be possible to run other programs/OSes?

It also looks like it's using those brother daisy wheels cartridges that I have a few of from a printer.
I like them a lot personally. I have gotten back into writing, and they are an excellent distraction free writing tool. I am actually trying to get a 90's model with a divorced monitor right now.
 
Yeah, mine came with a 1DD demo/tutorial disk and the manual says it formats them with 240KB... what a weird format to use in the early 90s.

I ordered I pack of assorted belts now and will try to read the disk when I put it back together again (it came apart much easier than I thought). I'm also thinking of replacing the backup battery.

The PCB looks very similar to the one in 8Bit-Guy's video:
 
The 240K were the SS 135 TPI versions using Brother's own GCR encoding. My recollection was that only 76 tracks were used. There was a related variation that recorded at 67.5 TPI used on the very low-end machines. Same encoding, just half the radial density.

Later systems eventually migrated to using a MSDOS type format.
 
I was finally able to buy a very decent Brother WP5600MDS with the amber monitor today for $20. It needs cleaned, but everything is working and it's not beat up. It is however missing all the manuals, and the OEM floppies with the external software these units came with. Is there a place where someone has archived the disk images for these WP's? The Brother website still has archived PDF's of the parts breakdown and user manuals thankfully. Also, the unit I just bought can format both 720k and 1.44k floppies. The floppy drive seem to be a standard 3.5 drive, so I wonder if one of the various floppy emulators out there would be compatible such as GoTek or HxC and would allow not only read, but write. The CPU in this unit is a Z80 and not one of the Intel 8051MC clones that Smith Corona uses, so I wonder how feasible a CP/M hack might be? If a CP/M hack were possible, a serial hack would make things even more interesting. I plan to use mine as a distraction free tool for writing a book, but these things feel like they have a lot of potential for mods. Also, the keyboard is fairly decent. It feels like your standard dome/membrane type. This was something I was concerned about as I am going to be putting a lot of hours on mine, and needed something that would last and have decent feel. I found a Smith Corona typewriter last week in a thrift store that had the same leaf spring keyboard as the WP's, and the Brother keyboard is superior, at least for touch typing. If you hunt and peck typewriter style type while writing I don't think the Smith Corona would feel too bad though.

Mine is identical to this one, except mine has an earlier manufacture date: Brother WP5600MDS
 
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I think this is what you need.

I don't understand the desire to mod a word processor to run CP/M, if you intend to use it as a "distraction-free tool."
Ah, thanks! That's at least one part of the software I wanted. I'll see if it works with mine. I don't have a desire to mod mine with CP/M. Was just pointing out the possibility for others that might be interested because I know modding the old Amstrad PWC's is popular. I suppose a CP/M mod would allow for a more advanced word processor, but I actually prefer the basic Brother software that is on ROM.
 
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My assortment of drive belts arrived and I managed to fix the WP-6. The drive is driving floppies and the word processor is processing words again.

Some points to mention during dis- and reassembly
- Make sure that the heads are moving before putting the drive together. I had to fiddle with it because it was a bit stuck in the initial head position
- Make sure to accomodate the drive flap so it moves freely. I had to take the machine apart again because it was stuck somehow
- If you don't reconnect all the sensors and modules it will hang during boot. It even needed the upper cover sensor reconnected.

Otherwise, it is pretty straightforward to take apart and I'm glad they color coded the connectors so it's easy to know which one goes where.

Attached are some pictures.

I wasn't able to dump the disk because fluxengine doesn't detect my homemade greaseweazle F1 and the flags in the documentation aren't being recognized.

I'd be interested to run other programs or OSes on it, but as it will be a lot of reverse engineering it will be a project for another day...
 

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Do be aware that Brother wupros were all over the place as regards disk formats.
Hi Chuck(G)m how do I get in touch with you directly regarding a question on a Brother WP3400 floppy drive which I am in need of a drive belt or floppy drive replacement. The Drive case has a sticker with 116067444, and the motor has a tag with BP24251611 01001. The belt is square, though I am not able to determine the length. My goal is a one off print out or capture screen images of a number of old word processing files. The issue is related to the floppy drive.
 
Can't really help you with the WP3400 drive belt issue. Although I own a WP3400, I've never had to service the floppy drive, so you're pretty much on your own with that one. You may want to check around on the forum posts to see what other people use for, say for the Matsushita 3.5" floppy drives; it can't be that different:

 
I just bought a bunch of square belts in varying lengths and thicknesses from Aliexpress and tried some until it felt right.
 
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