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UK's Oldest Computer To Be "Rebooted"
Smivs writes with this interesting piece of computer history, excerpted from the BBC: "Britain's oldest original computer, the Harwell, is being sent to the National Museum of Computing at Bletchley where it is to be restored to working order.
The computer, which was designed in 1949, was built and used by staff at the Atomic Energy Research Establishment in Harwell, Oxfordshire. It first ran in 1951 and was designed to perform mathematical calculations. It lasted until 1973.
When first built the 2.4m x 5m computer was state-of-the-art, although it was superseded by transistor-based systems.
The restoration project is expected to take a year. Although not the first computer built in the UK, the Harwell had one of the longest service lives.
Built by a team of three people, the device was capable of doing the work of six to ten people and ran for seven years until the establishment obtained their first commercial computer. 'We didn't think we were doing anything pioneering at the time,' said Dick Barnes, who helped build the original Harwell computer."
Which modern computers rely on oil? Especially circulating oil.
Idiot over-clockers don't particularly count.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Another cun8ti?ng
fuck off prick
/. these days. It used to be people who built and made computers do something, now it's people who build computers and expect something. this is why open source exists, fuckers - to show you how to take control of your own life. But you would rather your destiny was decided by MS or the govt. Sucks to be you.
Some of the finest minds in the world were working for Hitler !
and these days, many people are learning about computers by being led (badly) through the inconsistent minefield that is Office 2007. What has a badly laid out app got to do with computing ?
You must be gay. ( ooh, was that un-PC ?)
And as for the "ribbon" - hah. Adobe had that functionality 10 years ago, is this supposed to be new ? Ooh we'll stick a couple of references to this on the menu, make it look intelligent. Try using Fireworks or Dreamweaver from 2000 and see how "revolutionary" this is.
IMHO, this is what's up with