17 Jan
2008
17 Jan
'08
10:42 p.m.
On Thu, Jan 17, 2008 at 02:31:07PM -0800, Brent Hilpert wrote:
Anyone know offhand how many transistors were in the
first PDP-8? It's parallel
and core-mem and thus outside the OP's objective but could be interesting for a
ballpark comparison.
(I know somebody on the list has a site listing all the -8 versions) but was
the bit-serial version of the -8 done in discrete or IC? If IC, could be
interesting to translate it back to discrete and estimate the transistor count.
The "bit-serial" version you are thinking of is probably the PDP-8/S. It
does have a 1-bit serialized ALU. It was made with the same technology as
the original "Straight" 8 - R-series, S-series, and W-series FLIP-CHIPs
(transistors, not TTL ICs like the later M-series).
While I don't have a transistor count for the Straight 8, the count for
the -8/S is right around 1,000 (998?) I do not know if that includes
I/O driver boards for out-of-box peripherals (which is just about
everything, unlike other models of -8 which typically include, at the
very least, a console serial interface on IOTs 03/04).
-ethan
--
Ethan Dicks, A-333-S Current South Pole Weather at 17-Jan-2008 at 22:30 Z
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Ethan.Dicks at usap.gov http://penguincentral.com/penguincentral.html