[inforoots] GRiD and the IEEE 488 GPIB

[Barrie Robinson]

No no no !!  The IBM 610 cannot be classed as portable.  If we allow 
wheels then we open up all sorts of cans.  The Marconi Myriad (worlds 
first production third generation computer) could then be classed as 
portable - it was taken around South Africa on a trolley sort of device !!!



At 07:52 PM 2/18/2006, rweaver at ix.netcom.com wrote:
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>=======================================
>-----Original Message-----
> >From: Barrie Robinson <barrie at look.ca>
> >Sent: Feb 18, 2006 2:13 PM
> >To: Open Discussion about the history of the Information Age 
> <inforoots at computerhistory.org>, inforoots at computerhistory.org
>
>The first "Personal Computer" would have been the IBM 610, cira 
>1958.  Portable - it was on wheels, rolled into your office when you 
>wanted it, rolled out when done.   Don't have the specs handy, but 
>as I recall it did math on 256 digit numbers (!).  The program was 
>stored on paper tape - an  early advance over Von Neuman machines in 
>that the program could not modify itself(!).  Blank tape was 
>threaded first through a punch, then a reader.  After you had 
>punched your program, execution began as the tape was read and -- 
>this is the good part -- as the program was being read it was also 
>being punched again.  Thus when your punched copy had been read, a 
>new copy was ready on the same tape.  If  your program did 1000 
>iterations, then 1000 copies of the program were punched.
>
>So:
>
>-- stored program computer
>-- personal
>-- portable
>-- 1958 or thereabouts
>
>dick w
>
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Regards
Barrie

Barrie Robinson
(705) 721-9060