The Technomatic Winchester is one of my most treasured items. I bought it in February 2003, and it was the first ever Winchester Disc I owned for a BBC micro.

After almost five years of faithful service, the Technomatic Winchester broke down inexplicably and very suddenly in late December 2007. It has had very little use since then, although I did get it going in March 2009 for a brief period. It does now work sporadically, but it is very rarely used any longer, and it certainly isn't used for saving any valuable data.

The first picture set dates from about 2005, and I have retained my original pages from 2003 as well. In spring 2009, I bought an Akhter Winchester Disc as a direct replacement for the Technomatic, although it hasn't yet had the same kind of use as the Technomatic had whilst it was working. You can see the Akhter unit itself here but a comparative between the two models is the third picture set above.

The fourth picture set shows some testing I did using the Technomatic Winchester in March 2009 during its short revival before it lapsed back into coma, and the fifth is an attempt at making a backup of its contents during a further lucid period in November 2009; nine years later I had another go prior to a more concerted backup effort.

Please click on the picture links above to learn more.