60-pin memory card (mid-1980s – early 1990s) | Museum of Obsolete Media (original) (raw)

This design of card appears to have been a proprietary format introduced by Mitsubishi around the mid-1980s, and was possibly used by the NEC Ultralite and the Texas Instruments Travelmate, though it seems that despite using the same form factor, 60-pin cards were not interchangeable.

Mitsubishi appeared to have sold the design under the name Melcard (not to be confused with later PCMCIA cards under the same brand) and also used the card for internal use in various devices. These internal cards seem to have had a shutter covering the pins, rather then the pin holes of the removable cards.

The 60-pin design was also used for Hammond organ ROM cards, introduced in 1989.

The 60-pin memory card design is unrelated to the 68-pin JEIDA and PCMICA (PC Card) standards, which were unified in 1990 to avoid problems of incompatible memory card formats for sub-notebooks. Mitsubishi were part of the PC Memory Card International Association that defined the PC Card standard and went on to replace the 60-pin memory card.

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