COMPUTER INVENTION: 1960’s - STILL MASSIVE SIZE - SMALL RESULTS

Remember this? Quite an evolution of computer invention from the abacus to the 60’s:

The ENIAC of the 40’s evolved into the UNIVAC of the 60’s. The UNIVAC was still massive but the environment was quiet. This computer had all it’s main cabinets running from floor to ceiling. Air conditioning forced air through a raised floor and the air exhausted through a dropped ceiling.

Most of the central cabinets were walk-ins.

This is a picture of the main processor logic and the 65,536 36-bit words of core memory (about 256 kbytes). Memory access time was 8 microseconds per word - but through programming could approach 4 microseconds.

In 1968 - this “little baby” could be picked up for a measly $1.6 million. AND - you got a 1.3 MHz CPU - with half a megabyte of RAM - AND - a 100 megabyte hard drive. Feel better about the cost of a MAC? Oh - and a printer was extra.

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