page_title: IBM System/3
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: IBM System/3 / History
caption_attribution_description: English: IBM System/3 computer with punch card hardware from the 1970s on display at the Olmsted County Historical Society Museum in Rochester, Minnesota.
context_page_description: The IBM System/3 was an IBM midrange computer introduced in 1969, and marketed until 1985. It was produced by IBM Rochester in Minnesota as a low-end business computer aimed at smaller organizations that still used IBM 1400 series computers or unit record equipment. The first member of what IBM refers to as their "midrange" line, it also introduced the RPG II programming language. It is the first ancestor in the product line whose current version is the IBM i series and includes the highly successful AS/400.
context_section_description: At its launch in 1969 it was available for $1000/month - less than half cost of an IBM System/360 Model 20; the smallest member of the IBM System/360 family.
  Many of the original System/3 model 10 units were shipped diskless, with only the new IBM 5424 Multifunction Card Unit (MFCU) which read, punched, printed on and sorted the new, smaller 96-column punched cards introduced at the same time.
  IBM delivered the following models:
  1969 - IBM 5410, or System/3 Model 10, introduced (shipped in 1970)
  1970 - IBM 5406, or System/3 Model 6, introduced (disk-oriented system)
  1973 - IBM 5415, or System/3 Model 15, introduced
  1974 - IBM 5408, or System/3 Model 8, introduced
  1975 - IBM 5412, or System/3 Model 12, introduced
  1976 - IBM 5404, or System/3 Model 4, introduced
  The System/3 and successor models System/32, System/34, System/36 and System/38 are generally referred to in IBM terminology as "midrange systems"—in contrast to IBM's mainframes.
caption: System/3 processing unit and 5496 keypunch
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