The Parkes multibeam pulsar survey is a sensitive survey of a strip along the Galactic plane with |b| < 5 \degr and l = 260 \degr to l = 50 \degr .
It uses a 13-beam receiver on the 64-m Parkes radio telescope , receiving two polarisations per beam over a 288 MHz bandwidth centred on 1374 MHz .
Receiver and data acquisition systems are described in some detail .
For pulsar periods in the range 0.1 – 2 s and dispersion measures of less than 300 cm ^ { -3 } pc , the nominal limiting flux density of the survey is about 0.2 mJy .
At shorter or longer periods or higher dispersions , the sensitivity is reduced .
Timing observations are carried out for pulsars discovered in the survey for 12 – 18 months after confirmation to obtain accurate positions , spin parameters , dispersion measures , pulse shapes and mean flux densities .
The survey is proving to be extremely successful , with more than 600 pulsars discovered so far .
We expect that , when complete , this one survey will come close to finding as many pulsars as all previous pulsar surveys put together .
The newly discovered pulsars tend to be young , distant and of high radio luminosity .
They will form a valuable sample for studies of pulsar emission properties , the Galactic distribution and evolution of pulsars , and as probes of interstellar medium properties .
This paper reports the timing and pulse shape parameters for the first 100 pulsars timed at Parkes , including three pulsars with periods of less than 100 ms which are members of binary systems .
These results are briefly compared with the parameters of the previously known population .