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A Short History of Computers In the Movies

Posted by Unknown on from the smalltalk-in-the-movies dept.

Esther Schindler writes "The big screen has always tried to keep step with technology usually unsuccessfully. Peter Salus looks at how the film industry has treated computing. For a long time, the 'product placement' of big iron was limited to a few brands, primarily Burroughs. For instance: 'Batman: The Movie and Fantastic Voyage (both 1966) revert to the archaic Burroughs B205, though Fantastic Voyage also shows an IBM AN/FSQ-7 Combat Direction Central. At 250 tons for each installation (there were about two dozen) the AN/FSQ-7 was the largest computer ever built, with 60,000 vacuum tubes and a requirement of 3 megawatts of power to perform 75,000 ips for regional radar centers. The last IBM AN/FSQ-7, at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona, was demolished in February 1984.' Fun reading, I think."

13 of 165 comments (clear)

  1. The Q-7 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Am I the only one here who's programmed that beast? Assembly language; Fortran had just been invented. Might fit one into a current Walmart, might not. I recall during our training (LA) we heard of another computer in the city! Had to go talk to those guys across town.

    Still cranking out code, at 84.

    1. Re:The Q-7 by suso · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Am I the only one here who's programmed that beast? Assembly language; Fortran had just been invented. Might fit one into a current Walmart, might not. I recall during our training (LA) we heard of another computer in the city! Had to go talk to those guys across town.

      Still cranking out code, at 84.

      Whoever you are, Slashdot should interview you about your experiences.

    2. Re:The Q-7 by NetAlien · · Score: 5, Interesting

      At 18 in 1964, I was just a young guy who programmed the IBM 407 Accounting machine that was also installed with the AN/FSQ-7 in the Canadian underground NORAD headquarters in North Bay, Ontario. The program complexity on those machines was measured by how much the boards weighed. Lots of wires terminated with pins containing tiny metal balls (like hitch pins) to keep the pins from being pushed out when the board was inserted into the 407 to run whatever program its wiring instructed. Diodes were sometimes needed to prevent back-flow (that machine's source of bugs). Spent over 7 years in the "hole" with the huge Q-7. Nostalgia!

  2. Preventative Maintenance by Firethorn · · Score: 4, Interesting

    First, vacuum tubes lasted much longer than 6 months, Second, that's what PM is for. Preventative Maintenance would have you replacing the tubes before they're reaching EOL, increasing system reliability.

    You just have to accept a few hours of downtime every few months while they swap out thousands of tubes.

    --
    I don't read AC A human right
    1. Re:Preventative Maintenance by sumdumass · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I've seen old radios and televisions with vacuum tubes at least 35 or 30 years. I remember the television repair man coming into the house to replace a couple when they broke down. It was strange when we got our first solid state TV as they just replaced boards and there was no tubes we could run down to the drug store and get. You used to just look for a glow in the tube when something wasn't working right, if there was no glow, you took it with you and there was a testing machine made by rayovac right in the drugstore that you could test them on and it would cross reference any models to the ones they had in stock.

      I don't know how that compares to the tubes in the computers, but they were surprisingly resilient considering the age of the tech behind them.

    2. Re:Preventative Maintenance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting
      Some tubes could be made to last very long indeed, it was all about getting the cathode pure enough and the inner structure of the tube rugged enough. I give you the Bendix 6900.

      http://frank.pocnet.net/sheets/131/6/6900.pdf

      Enjoy, took me a while to fish up that one...

      Then you add a tube cooler to keep the envelope cool....

      http://www.audiohum.es/WebRoot/acens/Shops/audiohum_es/4CDA/8C25/B57E/99A6/67E7/0A01/006A/BCCA/2060100002.jpg

      They put tubes under the ocean on trans-Atlantic cable repeaters, they had to be reliable.

      Although I can't prove it, I'm pretty sure the Voyager probes use ceramic planar triodes (GE Y-1171) as their output tubes, the things that generate the radio waves beamed back to us.

      And last but not least, in WWII they invented electronic proximity fuzes... You guessed it, vacuum tubes. They didn't last too long (boom), but they managed to survive the 100000G acceleration out of a cannon and the 20000RPM that goes with it.

  3. Starring the Computer by LaughingRadish · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Here's something nice: http://starringthecomputer.com/. Various sightings of various computers in movies along with ratings of importance, realism, and visibility.

  4. Colossus: The Forbin Project by FairAndUnbalanced · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I think there's a ton of CDC equipment in Collosus: The Forbin Project. It has a fairly standard "computer takes over the world" plot line but is a bit of fun as well.

    Note the movie trivia entry at this IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064177/trivia

    "When the executives at Control Data Corporation found out that Universal was planning a major movie featuring a computer, they saw their chance for some public exposure, and they agreed to supply, free of charge, $4.8 million worth of computer equipment and the technicians to oversee its use. Each piece of equipment carried the CDC name in a prominent location. Since they were using real computers - not just big boxes with a lot of flashing lights - the sound stage underwent extensive modifications: seven gas heaters and five specially-constructed dehumidifiers kept any dampness away from the computers, a climate control system maintained the air around the computers at an even temperature, and the equipment was covered up at all times except when actually on camera. Brink's guards were always present on the set, even at night. The studio technicians were not allowed to smoke or drink coffee anywhere near the computers."

  5. Re:Unix command line in Tron Legacy by Stormwatch · · Score: 4, Informative

    That was an Unix system. More precisely, it was Silicon Graphics' IRIX with the fsn file viewer.

    --
    Circumcision is child abuse.
  6. Re:TV Repair by ebno-10db · · Score: 4, Informative

    going from ~12 tubes to 60k

    They used tricks, like reducing the filament voltage, to improve tube life. Nevertheless it was a problem, and I think these new solid state models show promise.

  7. Misses The Italian Job! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Everyone remembers the Minis, but the true geeks remember Benny Hill playing one of the cinema's first computer hackers.

  8. Prime Computers - The Choice of The Doctor! by BlackHawk-666 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Check out these old buggers, and the ads featuring Tom Baker, the legendary 4th Doctor Who.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSRC0S7pls8

    --
    All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
  9. Seconded by Viol8 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    A lot of people in programming think its purely a young mans game. That may have been true in the 60s and 70s but its not any longer. That old guy (or gal) you see shuffling down the street may have once coded up some pretty neat algorithm that helped fly your plane or did your banking or controlled the fuel injection on your car in the 80s. It would be nice to have an article about retired coders, what they did and their opinions of the dev world now. And whether vi is better than emacs ;o) No, scrap that last idea...