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 In 1968
the Dow
Jones Industrial Average was 943, the price for a gallon
of gasoline was $0.34, and Valley Processing, Inc.
entered into a computer time-sharing agreement with a
Baltimore firm that just purchased a new IBM System/360.
On one of the very first commercial computers, we
started running payrolls two nights a week. In a single
evening the System/360 could easily process three
payrolls totaling almost 45 checks.
 In
1972
the Dow Jones Industrial Average
was 1020, the price for a gallon of gasoline was $0.55,
and
Valley was one of the first in
town to install the next generation of technology, the
IBM System/3.
This system used 96 column
keypunch cards, a 20% increase over the old 80 column
punch cards. Over the years we were able to expand the
system to 4 disk drives and achieved an unimaginable 280
megabytes of storage.
We’re proud to say more
than a few clients processed on our System/3 are still
clients today.
In
1982 the Dow Jones
Industrial Average was 1046, the price for a gallon of
gasoline was $0.91, and Valley purchased a used IBM
System/34 from a bank in the Mid-West. This system was
less than half the physical size of our old system! New
green screen CRT's were placed throughout the office.
Cabinets full of keypunch cards were replaced by 8"
diskette magazines.
We soon purchased a high-speed laser printer that
allowed us to print payroll reports at an incredible 6
pages per minute.
In 1986
the Dow
Jones Industrial Average was
1895,
the price for a gallon of gasoline was $0.89, and our
need for speed grew. Valley purchased a used IBM
System/36 from a silverware manufacturer in Baltimore.
It took more than a few months to update our RPGII
source code in order to utilize all the features this
system had to offer. We soon added a dot matrix printer
that could print checks and W2 forms at an astonishing
560 characters per second. The System/36’s cartridge
tape drive, though it seemed impossible, could actually
backup all 400 megabytes of data in about two hours.
In 1993
the Dow Jones closed above 3,500 for the first Time
(3,500.03), the price for a gallon of gasoline was
$1.05, and Valley purchased a brand new IBM AS/400. Not
only was the new system fast and stable, it ran the same
OS as our old system allowing conversion to be completed
in a single weekend.
The AS/400’s physical size was about that of a
large tower PC.
We placed it in a cabinet in the corner of our office on
East Joppa Road in Towson.
In 2000
the Dow Jones closed above 10,000 for the first time
(10,006.78), the price for a gallon of gasoline was
$1.45, and IBM announced they would be stopping support
on our AS/400. We made the decision to start converting
to a Windows Server Platform.
2003
After 3 long years and 6 plus figures of capital
expenditures our conversion finished on July 1, 2003.
Valley -- To
Date
We continue to invest in technology
to keep our clients’ data secure, offer services even
national payroll companies don’t, and empower the Valley
staff to serve clients promptly and efficiently.
The staff at Valley Processing value
your trust and loyalty.
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