A terminal that needed its own processor
A “dumb terminal” was meant to be the user-facing end of a computer system, not a computer in its own right. It sent keystrokes to a larger machine and displayed the replies. But the Datapoint 2200 still had to manage its keyboard, screen, and communications—and making those functions programmable gave it a small processor of its own.
That processor was built from separate electronic components rather than a single chip. Meanwhile, Computer Terminal Corporation (CTC), the company behind the Datapoint, had asked Intel to develop a microprocessor for the design. Intel’s chip was delayed, so CTC built the processor itself and proceeded with the terminal.
A design that outlasted the machine
Intel eventually completed the chip, the 8008. CTC did not use it in the 2200, but the work was not wasted: the 8008’s instruction set—the basic commands a processor understands—helped shape Intel’s later processors. The 8080 developed that lineage, and the 8086 carried important compatibility with it into a new generation.
That inheritance is one reason the Datapoint story reaches into modern PCs. The 8086 became the starting point for the x86 family, whose processors still run most personal computers. The Datapoint 2200 did not contain an x86 chip; its influence traveled through the design Intel developed for it and then carried forward. A terminal built to talk to a bigger computer thus helped set the vocabulary of the processors that would eventually bring computing onto the desktop.
