电磁记录仪"The Telegraphone", 约1909年

By American Telegraphone Co., model 102, serial no. 125, patent no. 934843 from 21 September 1909, for recording and storage on magnetic discs, with 110 V electric motor, recording and storage head, oak case and lid (probably by Columbia Graphophone Co.). In good original condition. The American Telegraphone Co. was founded by Valdemar Poulsen in 1903. Poulsen registered his first patent for a wire-recording device in 1898 and unveiled his completed machine to the public at the Paris world exhibition in 1900 when he played a recording of Kaiser Franz Joseph's voice: a recording still in existence today. Further developments led to the model for recording and repeating on magnetic discs(patented by Frederic Schaefer) offered here. Although revolutionary for its time, the Telegraphone's sound fidelity was considered inferior to that of Edison's Dictaphone and Poulsen's invention did not meet with financial success, as a result of which few units were produced. Only with the invention of the amplifier did this type of technology eventually take off. All of today's magnetic-recording technology, from the hard-disc to the magnetic strips on credit cards, owe something to Poulsen's invention.The model offered in this auction is probably a prototype as no other surviving example is known. An important and historic device!