"Single instance" machines - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

10 Dec 1998

Boy, does that bring back memories.  When I was in middle school, a fellow
...
 from 3M (I think his name was Doug Kinney) visited our
school with a couple of computers.  One was quite large - in a rack, and used
decimal
arithmatic.  The other was a binary computer, and was much smaller.  It was
named "Little Binary Joe".

He left behind a schematic for some JK flip flops built out of Motorola
2N554 power transistors, and it used #49 light bulbs (not the more common
#47 bulbs).  A friend of mine convinced me that we should try and build it.
 We scrounged for parts, wrote letters, etc.  Got a free dial from the
telephone company, free resistors from Hamilton Hall in Milwaukee, but
Motorola would not come thru with the transistors.  We eventually had to
save up and order them.  We got about 4 flip flops built.

That got me started in electronics, from which I jumped into Computer Science.

Jay

At 02:55 AM 12/10/98 -0600, you wrote:
...
 On Wed, 9 Dec 1998, Aaron Christopher Finney wrote:

  And the 1/3 part is in the form of the
"electronic" computer I'm building
 from the January 1960 issue of Electronics Illustrated...(flip-flops,
 light-bulbs, and a rotary phone dial - woo-hoo!) I'm about 1/3
 completed... 
One of my favorite early personal computers!  I regret that the designer
didn't give it a name, though.  Specs:

Name: "Electronic Computer"
Intro: Jan 1960
Price: approx $35
Technology: discrete transistors
Memory: 6 bits
Input: rotary telephone dial
Clock speed: as fast as you can dial
Output: 12 incandescent lights
Programming language: patch cords

The author describes how to add, subtract, multiply, and divide on this
box, but it's really more of a calculator than a computer since it doesn't
have control logic or a clock.

I hope to do a web page some day that describes this machine and several
other home computers from the 1950's and 1960's.

-- Doug