Wonder how its performance would compare with a modern machine:

A project to recreate one of Britain’s pioneering computers has reached a key milestone.

The first recreated parts of the re-built Edsac machine have been switched on at The National Museum of Computing.

The Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator first ran in 1949 and was created to serve scientists at Cambridge University.

Few parts and plans were left of the original which has made the job of recreating the machine a difficult one.

“We don’t have blueprints to follow, so to create an authentic Edsac we have to adopt a 1940s mindset to re-engineer and redesign the machine,” said Andrew Herbert, leader of the recreation effort.

Students who worked with Edsac’s creators have been helping to guide the project, said Mr Herbert.

“We face the same challenges as those remarkable pioneers who succeeded in building a machine that transformed computing.”

Designed by Sir Maurice Wilkes, Edsac was the first computer specifically designed to be a computational workhorse. As well as aiding scientists, the machine was copied by cake maker Lyons to create the Leo – which was one of the first widely-used business computers.

The original machine used 3,000 valves arranged in a series of racks to crunch numbers, and fills a floor space 20 metres square.

The machine is being re-built in public at TNMOC and today saw the official opening of the Edsac exhibit and the switch on of the machine’s “clock” that will keep all of Edsac’s parts working in harmony. Other computational units of the machine will be added and switched on as work progresses.

One element that will not be duplicated in the modern replica is the system Edsac used as its memory store.

The original used long tubes of mercury to hold data but modern-day health and safety rules do not permit these to be used in the museum. Instead, the recreators are using a memory system based on nickel that was used in many machines that came after Edsac.

Full report: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30131447

Bubblecar said:

Wonder how its performance would compare with a modern machine:

A project to recreate one of Britain’s pioneering computers has reached a key milestone.

The first recreated parts of the re-built Edsac machine have been switched on at The National Museum of Computing.

The Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator first ran in 1949 and was created to serve scientists at Cambridge University.

Few parts and plans were left of the original which has made the job of recreating the machine a difficult one.

“We don’t have blueprints to follow, so to create an authentic Edsac we have to adopt a 1940s mindset to re-engineer and redesign the machine,” said Andrew Herbert, leader of the recreation effort.

Students who worked with Edsac’s creators have been helping to guide the project, said Mr Herbert.

“We face the same challenges as those remarkable pioneers who succeeded in building a machine that transformed computing.”

Designed by Sir Maurice Wilkes, Edsac was the first computer specifically designed to be a computational workhorse. As well as aiding scientists, the machine was copied by cake maker Lyons to create the Leo – which was one of the first widely-used business computers.

The original machine used 3,000 valves arranged in a series of racks to crunch numbers, and fills a floor space 20 metres square.

The machine is being re-built in public at TNMOC and today saw the official opening of the Edsac exhibit and the switch on of the machine’s “clock” that will keep all of Edsac’s parts working in harmony. Other computational units of the machine will be added and switched on as work progresses.

One element that will not be duplicated in the modern replica is the system Edsac used as its memory store.

The original used long tubes of mercury to hold data but modern-day health and safety rules do not permit these to be used in the museum. Instead, the recreators are using a memory system based on nickel that was used in many machines that came after Edsac.

Full report: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30131447

As per usual; you work out why I made this post : http://sound.westhost.com/clocks/ocm.html

Consider a quartz analog clock. Watch the seconds hand. When it jumps, think 1. when it stops, think 0.

Fake

:)

my brother worked at LEO computers in London. went to see him there one time. lots of tape and lots of nixie tubes.

They’ll use it to play pong.

Damn

>The original used long tubes of mercury to hold data

So how do long tubes of mercury hold data?

Delay line memory

>His solution used a column of mercury with piezo crystal transducers (a combination of speaker and microphone) at either end. Signals from the radar amplifier were sent to the piezo at one end of the tube, which would cause the transducer to pulse and generate a small wave in the mercury. The wave would quickly travel to the far end of the tube, where it would be read back out by the other piezo, inverted, and sent to the display.

Ha, my guitar has a piezo pickup.

and a lot of stove ignitions do too.

well not pick-ups as such but piezo systems.

> The first recreated parts of the re-built Edsac machine

I’m much more interested in Eniac than in Edsac.

Eniac was the first electronic general-purpose computer, the first test problem ran on Eniac consisted of computations for the hydrogen bomb.