Atanasoff Berry Computer Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description
Atanasoff Berry Computer is the name applied, long after the fact, to an experimental machine for solving systems of simultaneous linear equations, developed in 1938-42 at Iowa State University by Dr. John Vincent Atanasoff and Clifford E. Berry.The Atanasoff-Berry Computer, constructed in the basement of the Physics building at Iowa State University, took over two years to complete. It was first demonstrated in November of 1939. The computer weighed more than seven hundred pounds (320 kg). It contained approximately 1 mile (1.6 km) of wire, 280 dual-triode vacuum tubes, 31 thyratrons, and was about the size of a desk.
Because of the machine's innovative use of electronics for arithmetical calculation, it has been described as the first "electronic digital computer". However, it was a special-purpose, non-programmable "hard wired" machine, which distinguishes it from later, more general machines, such as the Z3, ENIAC, the Harvard Mark I, EDVAC, the University of Manchester designs, or Alan Turing's post-War designs at NPL and elsewhere.
The machine was, however, the first to implement three ideas that are still part of every modern computer:
- Using binary digits to represent all numbers and data
- Performing all calculations using electronics rather than wheels, ratchets, or mechanical switches
- Organizing a system in which computation and memory are separated.
The memory was a pair of drums, each containing 1600 capacitors that rotated on a common shaft once per second. The capacitors on each drum were organized into 32 "bands" of 50 (30 active bands and 2 spares in case a capacitor failed), giving the machine a speed of 30 additions/subtractions per second.
Although the Atanasoff-Berry Computer was an important step up from earlier computing machines, it was not fully automatic. An operator was needed to operate the control switches in order for the computer to function properly. Unlike modern computers, the Atanasoff-Berry Computer was not programmable, however; it was the first computer to have separate sections for the memory and computation. Little did Dr. Atanasoff realize that his computer would change the lifestyle of billions of people across the globe.
See also: History of computing hardware