Loewe 3NF

The Loewe 3NF was an early attempt to combine several functions in one electronic device.

[1] Produced by the German Loewe-Audion GmbH as early as 1926, the device consisted of three triode valves (tubes) in a single glass envelope together with two fixed capacitors and four fixed resistors required to make a complete radio receiver.

The resistors and capacitors had to be sealed in their own glass tubes to prevent them from contaminating the vacuum.

The device was produced not to enter the integrated circuit era several decades early, but to evade German taxes levied on a per valveholder basis.

[2] One major disadvantage of the 3NF was that if one filament failed, the whole device was rendered useless.