History of computing hardware: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 03:50, 12 July 2025

Revision as of 06:02, 20 July 2025

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In October 1947, the directors of [[J. Lyons and Co.|J. Lyons & Company]], a British catering company famous for its teashops but with strong interests in new office management techniques, decided to take an active role in promoting the commercial development of computers. The [[LEO computer|LEO I]] computer (Lyons Electronic Office) became operational in April 1951<ref>{{cite web | last = Lavington | first = Simon | title = A brief history of British computers: the first 25 years (1948–1973). | publisher = [[British Computer Society]] | url = http://www.bcs.org/server.php? | access-date = 10 January 2010 | archive-date = 2010-07-05 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20100705050757/http://www.bcs.org/server.php | url-status = dead }}</ref> and ran the world's first regular routine office computer [[job (software)|job]]. On 17 November 1951, the J. Lyons company began weekly operation of a bakery valuations job on the LEO – the first business [[:Category:Application software|application]] to go live on a stored-program computer.{{efn|{{harvnb|Martin|2008|p=24}} notes that [[David Caminer]] (1915–2008) served as the first corporate electronic systems analyst, for this first business computer system. LEO would calculate an employee's pay, handle billing, and other office automation tasks.}}

In June 1951, the [[UNIVAC I]] (Universal Automatic Computer) was delivered to the [[United States Census Bureau|U.S. Census Bureau]]. Remington Rand eventually sold 46 machines at more than {{US$|1 million}} each (${{Formatprice|{{Inflation|US|1000000|1951|r=-4}}|0}} as of {{CURRENTYEARinflation/year|US}}).{{Inflation-fn|US}} UNIVAC was the first "mass-produced" computer. It used 5,200 vacuum tubes and consumed {{val|125|ul=kW}} of power. Its primary storage was [[Sequential access|serial-access]] mercury delay lines capable of storing 1,000 words of 11 decimal digits plus sign (72-bit words).

In 1952, [[Groupe Bull|Compagnie des Machines Bull]] released the [[Bull Gamma 3|Gamma 3]] computer, which became a large success in Europe, eventually selling more than 1,200 units, and the first computer produced in more than 1,000 units.<ref name=":1">{{Cite journal |last=Leclerc |first=Bruno |date=January 1990 |title=From Gamma 2 to Gamma E.T.: The Birth of Electronic Computing at Bull |journal=Annals of the History of Computing |volume=12 |issue=1 |pages=5–22 |doi=10.1109/MAHC.1990.10010 |s2cid=15227017 |issn=0164-1239}}</ref> The Gamma 3 had innovative features for its time including a dual-mode, software switchable, BCD and binary ALU, as well as a hardwired floating-point library for scientific computing.<ref name=":1" /> In its E.T configuration, the Gamma 3 drum memory could fit about 50,000 instructions for a capacity of 16,384 words (around 100&nbsp;kB), a large amount for the time.<ref name=":1" />

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Compared to the UNIVAC, IBM introduced a smaller, more affordable computer in 1954 that proved very popular.{{efn|For example, Kara Platoni's article on [[Donald Knuth]] stated that "there was something special about the IBM 650".<ref>{{cite magazine |first=Kara |last=Platoni |title=Love at First Byte |magazine=Stanford Magazine |url=https://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2006/mayjun/features/knuth.html |date=May–June 2006 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20060925022700/http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2006/mayjun/features/knuth.html |archive-date=2006-09-25 |url-status=dead}}</ref>}}<ref>

V. M. Wolontis (18 August 1955) "A Complete Floating-Decimal Interpretive System for the I.B.M. 650 Magnetic Drum Calculator—Case 20878" Bell Telephone Laboratories Technical Memorandum MM-114-37, Reported in IBM Technical Newsletter No. 11, March 1956, as referenced in {{cite journal |title=Wolontis-Bell Interpreter |publisher=IEEE |journal=Annals of the History of Computing |volume=8 |issue=1 |date=January–March 1986 |pages=74–76 |doi=10.1109/MAHC.1986.10008 |s2cid=36692260}}

</ref> The [[IBM 650]] weighed over {{val|900|u=kg}}, the attached power supply weighed around {{val|1350|u=kg}} and both were held in separate cabinets of roughly 1.5{{times}}0.9{{times}}{{val|1.8|u=meters}}. The system cost {{US$|500000}}<ref>{{cite book |last=Dudley |first=Leonard |title=Information Revolution in the History of the West |year=2008 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=jLnPi5aYoJUC&pg=PA266 |isbn=978-1-84720-790-6 |publisher=Edward Elgar Publishing |page=266 |access-date=2020-08-30}}</ref> (${{Formatprice|{{Inflation|US|500000|1954|r=-4}}|0}} as of {{CURRENTYEARinflation/year|US}}) or could be leased for {{US$|3500}} a month (${{Formatprice|{{Inflation|US|3500|1954|r=-4}}|0}} as of {{CURRENTYEARinflation/year|US}}).{{Inflation-fn|US}} Its drum memory was originally 2,000 ten-digit words, later expanded to 4,000 words. Memory limitations such as this were to dominate programming for decades afterward. The program instructions were fetched from the spinning drum as the code ran. Efficient execution using drum memory was provided by a combination of hardware architecture – the instruction format included the address of the next instruction – and software: the [[Symbolic Optimal Assembly Program]], SOAP,<ref>{{Citation |last=IBM |title=SOAP II for the IBM 650 |year=1957 |id=C24-4000-0 |url= http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/650/24-4000-0_SOAPII.pdf |access-date=2009-05-25 |archive-date=2009-09-20 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090920081523/http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/650/24-4000-0_SOAPII.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref> assigned instructions to the optimal addresses (to the extent possible by static analysis of the source program). Thus many instructions were, when needed, located in the next row of the drum to be read and additional wait time for drum rotation was reduced.

===Microprogramming===