Computing history at CERN - Re: what IBM system is this?

Brent Hilpert hilpert at cs.ubc.ca
Sat Jul 4 22:07:02 CDT 2015


On 2015-Jul-04, at 7:15 PM, dave at 661.org wrote:

> On Sat, 4 Jul 2015, Toby Thain wrote:
> 
>> On 2015-07-04 7:37 PM, simon wrote:
>>> found in the archives of CERN, this image is beautiful! but what IBM
>>> system is this.
>>> https://cds.cern.ch/record/1847692
>> 
>> There's a pretty prominent "7890" on those cpu(?) cabinets.
>> 
>> Is it the IBM-compatible Siemens 7890(S) mentioned here?
>> http://cnlart.web.cern.ch/cnlart/2001/003/comp30-last/
> 
> How many individual computers are in that picture?

Including the other photos, identified so far:

	Cyber 170		(2 machines I presume)
	Siemens 7•890	(1 or 2 ?)
	VAX 780
	a Modcomp mini	(speaking of out-of-the mainstream minis)

Note that that room is just for DD division machines - general computing services: data processing, number crunching, external networking, etc.

At the time, the accelerator control was being done by Norsk-Data minis located in the accelerator control room, as shown and explained to me by someone who had worked on their programming; and there were machines all over the rest of the site associated with things like data-collection from experiment sensors, assorted labs, etc. I recall for instance, seeing a VAX-750 doing sensor data-collection, and a lab filled with some graphics machines, but don't recall what type they were.



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