The text-only monochrome IBM 2260 cathode-ray tube (CRT) video display terminal (Display Station) plus keyboard was a 1964 predecessor to the more-powerful IBM 3270 terminal line which eventually was extended to support color text and graphics.There were three models of 2260.

The 2260 was a raster display with the unusual property that the scan lines were vertical – they went from top to bottom rather than the more common left to right.

Mainframe computers used magnetic core memory, which was too expensive for use in video display terminals.

The delay line was an unusual mechanical (not electrical) spiral wire with an electromagnet on one end and a torsion rotation detector on the other (which was conceptually similar to a phonograph needle pickup).

One effect of the 2848 delay line was that if a heavy person walked next to the controller, or if it was mounted next to a vibration source (like an elevator), digital bits of screen images would be lost on all of the video displays, which would then be repeated continuously through the feedback loop until a new video display was transmitted to all of the connected terminals.