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Colossus has been Rebuilt

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the no-not-the-one-in-sardia dept.

Max Driver writes "In celebration of D-Day, "Colossus", one of the earliest electronic code-breaking machines, has been rebuilt after ten years of effort by computer conservationists. Colossus was used to break the Lorenz cipher. This story is being reported by the BBC. Remarkably, the use of parallel processing (five tape channels) and short gate delay time (1.2 microseconds) allows the Colossus to match the speed of a modern PC."

5 of 279 comments (clear)

  1. The Forbin Project by Seumas · · Score: 5, Funny

    Phew. For a moment, I thought they were talking about this Colossus.

    An artificially intelligent supercomputer is developed and activated, only to reveal that it has a sinister agenda of its own

  2. (sigh) by Lobo_Louie · · Score: 5, Funny

    ... and the IRS still uses it to this day.

  3. Re:Colossus of Rhodes by ComaVN · · Score: 5, Funny

    Yeah, good for trade, but that is obsoleted by electricity, so why would anyone want to build that now.

    --
    Be wary of any facts that confirm your opinion.
  4. Re:Go and visit Bletchley Park! by pklong · · Score: 5, Funny

    Oh great, a load of Slashdotters turning up. I can just imagine the poor guides when they ask the obligatory "Does anyone have any questions?".

    Also they had better rope off the area properly or for some reason the machine will print out "Visit my 1337 site goatse" or "First Post" constantly.

    --

    Philip

    Signatures are broken

  5. Re:Not really by arevos · · Score: 5, Funny

    I really put that down to two things:

    1) Most people in England still only have 486 computers
    2) He's talking about deciphering stuff off a paper tape, something a modern PC can't do at any speed
    3) An old guy bragging about life's accomplishments (which is okay).

    At least we can count.