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Sunday, December 19, 2010

ELECTROMECHANICAL & ELECTRONIC COMPUTERS

ELECTROMECHANICAL COMPUTERS
    
   In the early part of twentieth century, tabulating machines were growing rapidly. Meanwhile, the computational need of the nations was also increasing. So, governments, universities, and research organizations were trying to find the solution to meet those needs.
In 1984, next important event occurred in history. The electromechanical computer was born with the development of MARK I by Howard Aiken and other was constructed MARK I at Harvard University under the sponsorship of IBM (International Business Machine).
The MARK I also known as the Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator. It was 50ft. long and 8ft. high. It used electronic tubes and electrical relays.
MARK I took 41/2seconds to multiply two 23 digit numbers. It was able to produce ballistics tables that were used in connection with Second World War. The input device used was the punched paper tape.


ELECTRONIC COMPUTERS

          The age of electronic computer began after 1890 when vacuum tubes were introduced. Such tubes were thousands of times faster than the earlier electromechanical devices.
The first electronic digital computer was developed by John V. Attansoff and his student Clifford Berry. It was called Attansoff-Berry Computer (ABC computer).
ABC computer used vacuum tubes (electronic device) instead of electromechanical relays. It was comparatively very fast as compared to the previous computers.
ABC computer could not become popular because it could solve only certain type of problem and it used advanced electronic technology of that time.

2 comments:

  1. Mme/Mr. Abhay Sharma

    Please let me comment that it is unlikely that "In 1984, next important event occurred in history."

    With regards and friendship
    Georges Theodosiou

    ReplyDelete