The Smart, Quiet Type : The Conversion From Electrics to Electronics Has Been Swift as Typewriters Take on Tasks Once the Domain of Computers
The IBM Selectric was a child of the 1960s, revolutionizing the business of typing with its lightening-fast typing ball and its lack of a movable carriage.
But like many artifacts of the Big Chill generation, the Selectric has passed quietly from the scene. The hulking metal machine was done in last summer by the electronic era.
In homes and offices across the country, Selectrics and other electric typewriters as well as their manual cousins are being replaced by a new generation of machines that can do things their plodding predecessors never approached. Along the way, the electronic typewriter has energized an industry that increasingly must compete with personal computers.
“It took about 30 years for the industry to convert from manual to electric,” said industry analyst Ken Camarro, adding that the transition spanned from about 1948 to 1978. “It’s taken about nine years to convert from electrics to electronics.”
The manual typewriter speeded up the task of writing in the late 1800s, and the electric picked up the pace even more. The built-in correcting feature brought convenience and neatness when it appeared in the early 1970s. But electronic typewriters and word processing typewriters, powered by microcomputers, bring a whole new set of skills to the typing table.
An electronic typewriter not only can correct mistakes, it can tell the typist when a word has been misspelled or even overused. Built-in dictionaries can provide the correct spelling on a display screen--ranging from tiny to TV-sized--and thesauruses can offer alternative words or phrases.
The machines can remember and later print out what was typed earlier. Centering and tabulation can be done automatically, eliminating the need to count spaces. The electronic typewriters are much lighter than those that came before and have far fewer parts, reducing the need and expense of repair.
Functions Combined
Smith Corona introduced a feature this year called “Phrase Alert” that will tell the typist if a trite or redundant phase has been used out of 1,600 word combinations, said Fred Feuerhake, vice president of marketing. “It’s really become quite clever.”
The latest thing in typing is the so-called hybrids that combine even more computer functions with that of the typewriter. The machines look like computers but can be used as typewriters.
“Many secretaries have both a PC and a typewriter on their desk or nearby,” said Roger Savitt, an IBM spokesman. “In one machine we have something that will do both. . . . It really shows the marriage of the high end of the typewriter with the low end of the computer line.”
Prices for electronic typewriters range from slightly less than $100 for the most simple portable machines to nearly $2,000 for sophisticated office typing systems.
Prices have dropped tremendously since electronic typewriters were introduced, and the new machines do much more per dollar.
For example, a $199 Smith Corona in 1986 had a memory that could correct mistakes made lines earlier in the copy and could erase entire words at the push of a button. Now, for the same price, the typewriter has a 16-character display and a 7,000-character internal memory, among other things, Feuerhake said.
When it was introduced in 1961, the IBM Selectric cost $395, which translates into more than $1,500 in 1988 dollars, Savitt said. For $1,500 today, IBM offers its Wheelwriter 50 Series II typewriters that has a 25-line display, 25-page storage memory, and “a whole host of functions that in 1961 could not be imagined,” he said.
Why do people buy typewriters at all these days when computers, accompanied by printers, can do so much more?
The relatively low cost of typewriters is one reason, experts say. In addition, there are things that computers just don’t do well, such as typing preprinted forms, envelopes, index cards and other small items.
Studies by Smith Corona and Princeton University have found that personal computers are used 70% of the time for typing rather than computer functions, Feuerhake said.
“That’s like hunting a rabbit with a cannon or driving a racing car down to the store for a quart of milk,” Feuerhake said. “It’s far more than you really need.
Offer Many Functions
“The computer industry two, three, four years ago said the typewriter is doomed to extinction,” he said. “The typewriter people got smart, and what we’ve done is make the typewriter much smarter than just a typewriter.”
Said Savitt of IBM: “If you need a PC, you should get it. If you don’t, we have typewriters that do many of the functions that people are interested in.”
Retailers report high demand for many of the electronic typewriters.
At Adray’s, a small consumer electronics chain in Los Angeles, entire shipments of some models have sold out in as little as two days in some stores, said Vladimir Alvarez, manager of the small appliance department at the Van Nuys store.
Each year, 4 million to 4.5 million office and portable typewriters are sold, compared to 4 million to 5 million home computers, said Camarro, who heads Camarro Research, a Fairfield, Conn.-based market research and publishing firm that focuses on office automation products.
Smith Corona estimates that it has a 52% market share of the approximately 3 million portable typewriters sold in the United States, up from about 29.5% in April, 1985. IBM leads the office typewriter market with an estimated 35% to 45% share, Camarro said.
Sales this year are expected to dip slightly because of consumer disenchantment with “thermal” electronic typewriters, said Julie Voss, head of the typewriter division at Dataquest, a Silicon Valley market research firm.
Thermal typewriters transfer letters to the page by using an electronically heated element. More common are impact-printing typewriters with a daisy wheel or cup that actually strikes the ribbon and paper.
Thermal typewriters tend to be smaller, quieter and cheaper but impact-printing typewriters produce a cleaner type and are easier to correct, Voss said.
The frustration for typewriter makers, but also a significant source of future sales, are all the consumers who are holding on to their old faithfuls, Voss said.
“The agony in these economic times for manufacturers is there are 15 million to 18 million typewriters out there that could be replaced if consumers could only be educated,” she said.
