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Historical
Background
Tung-Sol
was a well known, but small scale manufacturer of vacuum tubes from the
1940s through the 1960s. As other vacuum tube manufacturers began
investigating semiconductor technology in the early 1950s, so too did
Tung-Sol. The early development work on transistors was done at the Bloomfield, NJ vacuum tube facility. The 2N63, 2N64 and 2N65 appear to be the
first Jedec “2N” numbered transistors to be sold commercially by Tung-Sol,
and the preliminary data sheets for these devices are dated early
1957. Note that Raytheon had introduced these “2N6X” numbers in 1956,
so Tung-Sol should be considered a second-source supplier. The 2N63,
2N64 and 2N65 are similar devices, varying only in power gain, with the
2N65 having the highest gain. A striking feature of all Tung-Sol
transistors is the beautiful “Robin’s Egg” blue case color and the brightly
decorated cardboard packaging, as shown above.
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