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ENIAC is 60


Laserwolf
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Long before microchips and semiconductors, or PCs and MACs, there were vacuum tubes...

 

Sixty years ago this week, the US Army unveiled the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer or ENIAC. We've come a long, long way since.

 

The best quote in relation to the ENIAC is from Popular Mechanics in 1947:

 

"Where a calculator on the ENIAC is equipped with 18,000 vacuum tubes and weighs 30 tons, computers in the future may have only 1,000 vacuum tubes and perhaps weigh 1-1/2 tons."

 

An you thought Supernova was high tech... Even our MK VI Computers still weigh 100 tons!!!

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Long before microchips and semiconductors, or PCs and MACs, there were vacuum tubes...

 

Sixty years ago this week, the US Army unveiled the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer or ENIAC. We've come a long, long way since.

 

The best quote in relation to the ENIAC is from Popular Mechanics in 1947:

 

"Where a calculator on the ENIAC is equipped with 18,000 vacuum tubes and weighs 30 tons, computers in the future may have only 1,000 vacuum tubes and perhaps weigh 1-1/2 tons."

 

An you thought Supernova was high tech... Even our MK VI Computers still weigh 100 tons!!!

 

Yes. But our Mk VI Computer Systems are down to just 500 vacuum tubes!!! :D

 

TErnest

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The best quote in relation to the ENIAC is from Popular Mechanics in 1947:

 

"Where a calculator on the ENIAC is equipped with 18,000 vacuum tubes and weighs 30 tons, computers in the future may have only 1,000 vacuum tubes and perhaps weigh 1-1/2 tons."

 

A couple of other interesting facts.

 

The first programmers were women. They could be spared from the war effort and had the most experience: programming calculators.

 

ENIAC was programmed using large patch panels. The first "Software bug" was literally an insect (probably a moth) that was fried on sorted out a circuit.

 

And for another great pronouncement, Thomas Watson Sr. once thought the worldwide market for computers was 17 units. His son convinced him that it was bigger and he agreed to go ahead and fund computer development at IBM. Before that IBM was known for their Hollerith machines which sorted punch cards.

 

Enough tech history. Back to work!

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But who remembers Colossus? which is 62 years ago.

 

That was the British Codebreaking machine, yes?

 

Yes, built by a postman (OK a Post Office employee).

 

After the war, Winston Churchill ordered that all the colossii(???) built be destroyed. And no-one was to talk about the fact that they knew anything about a programable machine.

 

Although I don't think that was entirely true because some were used at GCHQ.

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