ALL of my sales are either products, utilities, and new parts from my six closed Computer & Electronics stores, or from my personal collection of parts, hobby supplies and design aids, used in my past endeavors as an Inventor, Electrical Engineer, Contract Designer, Amateur Radio Operator, Gunsmith, Gun Store Owner & Collector, and way-too-many interests hobbyist. I am too old & infirm to further utilize them, and need to empty out my poor daughter’s (“The Slumlord”) house, garage, sheds, and associated lawn areas! LOL

The Vector 8801-1 Universal MicroComputer/Processor Plugboard is

a blank prototype circuit board designed for building custom electronics for early microcomputers that used the S-100 bus architecture. It was produced by Vector Electronics and became popular with computer hobbyists in the mid-1970s. 

Key features

• S-100 Bus compatibility: The board was sized to fit into S-100 bus card cages and featured a 50-pin, 100-contact card-edge connector to interface with the S-100 backplane.
• Prototyping: It was a "plugboard," meaning it was a blank canvas with a grid of holes for hand-wiring components. This allowed hobbyists and engineers to build custom interface cards, CPU boards, or memory expansions for their S-100 systems.
• Non-plated through-holes: The 8801-1 model had non-plated through-holes (NPTH), meaning the holes were not metallized. This required components to be wired to each other on the board, either with wire-wrapping or point-to-point soldering.
• Physical dimensions: The board was made from an epoxy glass composite and measured 10.50" x 5.30" x 0.062" (or 254mm x 134.62mm x 1.57mm) with 0.042" diameter holes.
• Documentation: Vector Electronics provided instruction sheets and wiring layout papers to assist users in documenting their custom designs. 

Historical context

In the early days of personal computing, the S-100 bus was a widely adopted standard for hobbyist computers. Because off-the-shelf expansion cards were limited, prototyping boards like the Vector 8801-1 were essential for users to build their own hardware. This helped fuel the explosive growth of personal computing by enabling experimentation and customization. 

Vector Electronics also offered other models for the S-100 bus, such as the 8801-6, which featured plated through-holes and pads for simpler construction

100   Bus,   Vectorbord® Plugbord™

Specifications

• 100 Gold plated edge contacts (50 each side)   on 0.125"(3.175mm) centers.
​• No circuit pattern edge contacts only.

Unrestricted component placement over entire board surface