23 Jan
2010
23 Jan
'10
4:47 p.m.
Phillip,
Thanks for the lead on the book, and no I have not seen it.
The Harry Porter relay computer and others seem to all use Zuse 4PDT relay design for the
alu.
If you have not been to his web site, take a look at the youtube, It appears that there
are a lot of us relay computer guys out there (when the you tube finishes there are
related links presented).
Somewhat related, and also my interest, are the marble machines that do logic. Of course
there is the Edmund Scientific NIM plastic 3 bit machine, analog computers and dont forget
Martin Gardner and the deck of cards paper computers.
There is more to classic computing than collecting microprocessor based machines.
Thanks again,
Randy
Date: Sat, 23 Jan 2010 10:45:57 +0000
From: philip at axeside.co.uk
To:
Subject: Re: starting my relay computer project
Randy Dawson wrote:
_________________________________________________________________
Hotmail: Free, trusted and rich email service.
http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/196390708/direct/01/
After years and years of interest in this, way
back to the sci am
'Ameteur Scientist' articles, I am beginning this project.
I have a unique and amazing resource, I work for a semiconductor
company in test engineering, and we use tons of those little TO-5
Teledyne relays in our IC test boards. I have scavenged >1000 or so
for the project, so its not going to be a giant machine like Harry
Porters:
Have you read "The Computer - My Life" by Konrad Zuse (New York:
Springer Verlag, 1993. ISBN 0-387-56453-5)? Mostly historical /
autobiographical, but some good technical bits on the evolution of relay
logic as Zuse's designs got more mature. Interesting how the number of
relays per bit he needed in his adder circuit got less and less...
Philip.