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Walther ETR-1 Desktop Calculator


Walther ETR-1, Circa 1969

The Walther ETR-1 is the first electronic calculator that Walther put to market in 1969. The machine was not manufactured by Walther, however. The ETR-1 was manufactured by Ricoh in Japan, and sold by Walther in Europe as the ETR-1 via an OEM agreement between Walther and Ricoh. The ETR-1 was a Ricoh Ricomac 1210 with Walther badging and identification tag. This machine is a basic four-function desktop calculator with twelve digits of capacity, and an accumulator-style memory register. Decimal point is fixed by a front panel slide switch at 0, 3, or 5 digits behind the decimal. The omission of a setting for two digits behind the decimal is curious, as such a setting is commonly used for financial calculations. Display is via Nixie tubes made by NEC, with 1/2" high digits and a right-hand decimal point. The memory register has a summation mode that will automatically accumulate sums of products or quotients in the memory register. The memory register can also be directly added to or subtracted from, as well as stored directly into (from the display), or recalled to the display. The ETR-1 uses a combination of small-scale MOS integrated circuits made by NEC, in conjunction with a large number of discrete semiconductor devices (transistors, diodes) and passive devices (resistors, capacitors).
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