Compugraphic CG Universal 2

ANOTHER machine not listed in the museum's catalogue.

It would appear to be one of the Whittaker company's early photosetters.

Metal Type regular Steve Young supplied the following information on the Compugraphic Universal:

The Universal 4 was a single user input and output machine. The bromide was contained in a section on the side of the machine and the user keyed text directly on to the paper.

There was a single line display on the front above the keyboard and one could edit one line at a time, as soon as the "Execute" (return) key was depressed the line was written to bromide and the display emptied for the next line.

There were removable "width cards" for the various different fonts. Four fonts could be loaded at the same time (hence Universal 4) -- the wrong width card with the wrong font produced interesting results!!!

The fonts were contained on individual film strips which were wrapped around a drum at the other side of the machine — when the relevant key was depressed the drum revolved until the corresponding letter was positioned over the top of the place on the bromide indicated by the width card and the light source flashed it onto the bromide via a lens and the lens moved to the next position and so on.

When an ad was completed, the user hit return a couple of times and then commenced another ad. When the cassette was full, or whenever required, the user removed it and placed it directly into the developer. On output the comp then cut and pasted the text.