21 Oct
1998
21 Oct
'98
1:08 a.m.
Yes, and again that proves my point. A discrete
transistor based computer
can not compete with a high-end monolithic microprocessor. The laws of
physics conspire against it.
Well, I think everyone can agree on that today, or anything past the
80386.
Motorola claims to have started shipping ECL
integrated circuits in 1962.
Why were people still building computers using discrete transistors for
years after that? Many of the high-end computers used discrete
implementations of non-saturating logic that was very similar to ECL.
The MECL 1 family dates to the early or mid 1960s, and really was fast for
the time (something like 7 nS tpd average). They came in cans (I do not
know if the DIP was developed yet. By 1969, they were obsolete. I do not
know if any computer used them.
Discrete transistor machines hung on until the late 1960s, simply because
ICs were so darn expensive. At a few dollars per _gate_, lots of
transistors and all of the board real estate starts to look good.
William Donzelli
william(a)ans.net