21 Sep
2021
21 Sep
'21
3 p.m.
Fred Cisin wrote on Sat, 18 Sep 2021 13:45:04 -0700 (PDT)
On Sat, 18 Sep 2021, dwight via cctalk wrote:
The TI people were selling their chip as a simple four operation
calculator. Here is what the Sinclair people did with it:
http://files.righto.com/calculator/sinclair_scientific_simulator.html
An interesting project that Sir Clive was involved in was the wafer
scale integration effort by Ivor Catt.
http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/8199/Anamartic-Limited/
The goal was to eventually do what the Cerebras people are now doing
(with lots of positive press), but their first products attempted to
replace hard disks with battery-backed wafer scale SRAMs. The many-core
processors would come later, but as HD densities took off (after only
having grown slowly from the mid 1970s to mid 1980s) the investors
pulled out.
-- Jecel
Of course, Busicom was the first programed
microprocessor driven
calculator, it wasn't the first calculator using calculator ICs. That is
what Busicom was trying to compete with, when going to Intel in the
first place.
I think that the Sinclair used TI calculator ICs.
Unless he had a special "in" with TI, AND was fastest to market, then it
is doubtful that he could legitimately claim to be "FIRST".