Acorn IEEE488 Interface

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Acorn IEEE488 Interface (front) 

The red stamp says "UNIV SALF" which probably stands for Salford University.

 Acorn IEEE488 Interface (right)

This shows the classic Acorn "cheese wedge" shape.

 Acorn IEEE488 Interface (back)

The back of the Acorn IEEE488 interface shows, from the left:

1. The white power cable
2. The fuse
3. The power on/off switch
4. The blue socket to connect the IEEE488 cable

Acorn IEEE488 Interface (bottom) 

The bottom of the IEEE488 Interface shows the serial number in the middle. This is not in the usual Acorn format because the IEEE488 Interface was produced for Acorn by Intelligent Interfaces.

The ribbon cable connects to the BBC Micro's 1MHz bus.

Also note that one of the rubber feet is missing.

 Acorn IEEE488 Interface with top removed

 Acorn IEEE488 Interface circuit board

The large IC near the top is the TMS9914 IEEE488 controller.

Here is a HiRes picture of the Acorn IEEE488 circuit board .

Manuals and documents

Here is the Acorn product brochure for the IEEE488 Interface:

Here is the Acorn IEEE488 Interface User Guide.

Description

The Acorn IEEE488 Interface allows a BBC Micro to control up to 14 IEEE488 compatible devices (typically technical and laboratory instruments). The IEEE488 Interface requires the BBC Micro to have OS version 1.0 or higher and the IEEEFS ROM installed. The IEEE488 Interface connects to the BBC Micro's 1MHz bus and has a socket to enable other devices to be daisy chained to the bus.

The IEEE488 Interface was designed and manufactured for Acorn by Intelligent Interfaces  and uses the TMS9914 IEE488 controller.

IEEE488 (a.k.a. HP-IB or GP-IB) was invented in the 1960's by Hewlett-Packard (hence Hewlett-Packard Interface Bus - HP-IB) to allow interconnection of instruments and controllers/computers. for further details see the Wikipedia IEEE488  entry.