Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

I know a few people here have some history with Quantel products so I thought it would be a good place to ask around for anything interesting about Quantel and their old products

I am producing a short 15 minute video documenting some of Quantel's history from the 70's through to the 1990's. Really I am centring around the old DPB Classic Paintbox but I do want to touch on other areas because Quantel wasn't just about the Paintbox

What I would like is to find some pictures of their earlier products and any other interesting historical pictures featuring Quantel's products.

I'd also love to hear any interesting anecdotes about the creation of their products.

So in terms of photos, I'd be looking for pictures related to the Micro Consultants Company in the 1970's. Also pictures of any early Quantel products like the Quantel/IVC TBC and then later products like the DFS, DSC, DPE & DLS from the 70's.

I would really like to get pictures of the DVM-8000 Mirage and Harry (did Harry have a model number?) from the 1980's.

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

I have a book from the mid 1980s on TV Graphics which features some good pictures of then current equipment, it didn't cost too much when I bought it off Amazon Marketplace so it might be worth getting a copy.

I can send you the fill details if you like.

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

Not sure how useful this will be to you, but here goes.

I worked at Solid State Logic (SSL) near Oxford from 1988 to '89, at the time SSL and Quantel were both part of the UEI group and several Quantel people were seconded to SSL.

I was working on a hard-disk based digital audio editing system known as O1, the project had been started a couple of years earlier and in the summer of 1988 most of the engineering team left or were poached by another company. I was part of a team tasked with finishing off O1 and making it a saleable product.

The people who originally came from Quantel were also working on a digital audio editing system that was initially known as HarrySound as it was intended to be a companion product to the Harry video editing system. This later became the ScreenSound product.

The O1 project "borrowed" some software development tools and other items from Quantel. I had to port a real-time operating system that Quantel developed in-house to the O1 system that was 68000 based but of a somewhat different hardware design to what I believe was a design used in several Quantel products, also 68000 based.

I left SSL around August 1989 and the O1 was cancelled around the start of 1990.

John

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

I have copies (well originals really if you know what I mean) of the sales handouts for the DPE5001/5001 Plus, also for the the DFS3001. I can scan them in, but how to get them to you?

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

@red16v
That would be awesome, i can create a share on my google drive you could use if you can upload the scans?

@jjl
Interesting that people were shared between the UEI companies. I had read something somewhere that mentioned SSL in connection with Quantel

@Richard_FM
Looking at your location, i am in Stockport too, would there be a possibility of meeting up to scan anything relevant?

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

I am not at all familiar with 'google drive' but if you are willing to take me through it gently I'm willing to give it a go.

I have three pieces of sales literature, so I will scan them in to three separate folders on my laptop and let you know when I've completed that.

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

Ok, I've created a folder on my laptop which has 3 pdf files within it - one pdf per sales bumpf - total folder size 19MB.

Edited to add. The DFS 3001 was hired in each weekend to the OB department - footy. It was used as a synchroniser which was it's main function, but it could do some limited picture movement and sizing/zoom functions. We had two channels of the DPE 5001 - lovely bit of kit for its era. We also had an ex-Olympics DSC4000 plus the Silk option. The Silk option was an optional extra bit of external hardware that could be wired into the signal path (were talking parallel digits and wide flat cabling here) It had a rotary control on the front panel that allowed the user to control the balance between silky motion and picture definition - in other words you could have silky smooth action with smudgy pictures, or jerky motion with crystal clear pictures - or anywhere in between and it was purely subjective. Nice bit of kit though so get me wrong on that.

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

Hopefully, I'm a bit busy at times, but I'm sure we could arrange a time to meet. I should be OK to give you a lend of the book.

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

I was lucky enough to visit Clientele factory in Thatcham in the mid 1980s I remember them showing us a 1000 line tv picture it was a still picture of a bowl of fruit you could See the fur on a peach the picture was that good they also showed us a PCB with liquid cooling system it was for video processing and consumed around 3 Kilowatts!

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

I have a rather battered DFS3001 in the collection, ex BBC outside Broadcasts. I have some control panel parts for it too, but I recall not enough to control it?

I would like to be included in the Brochure distribution please.

Getting it listed on the museums website is job number 456,999C ! lots to do.

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

Have you access to this:

IEE Colloquium on UK Broadcast Manufactuerers - The Pioneering Years (Digest No: 1997/106)

NB that's the IEE/IET's misspelling of 'manufacturers', not mine!

The link is here:

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/mostR...?punumber=5081

The item on Quantel is quite good, as I recall. I was there on the day (we had provided a lot of working broadcast cameras) and it was a thoroughly informative and revealing event.

I have hard copy from the day and I think that there's a free copy of the whole collection of papers some where out there on the web. I can't spot it right now, but I can probably send you a scan of the hard copy if you pm me.

Best regards,

Paul M

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

Is this the one?

https://excelsior.asc.ohio-state.edu...Fs/Quantel.pdf

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

Yes, that's the one! I knew that it was online without paying for it as I had downloaded the one about Marconi by Tom Mayer.

Well found! I hope that it's of use to the OP.

Paul M

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

The trouble is, your original link has links to numerous other stories that I would like to read about - the history of EMI, Marconi and since my first love was telecine - the Cintel stories, they're the ones I'd personally like to read and I can't find those !!!

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

If you pm me I can send you the Marconi one as I have it on file (I'm ex-Marconi). It's a great read and places so much in context. It really nails some of the tales from the BBC et al, telling the other side of the story.

Cheers,

Paul M

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

thanks, yes i do have a copy, it's been very helpful so far

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

the brochures along with a load of other original quantel documentation are located here to download:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folde...ndSVU1UVFhNTWc

Re: Wanting Quantel photos & stories etc
 

Thanks

Brian