Museum switches on historic computer

[maureenho]

Museum switches on historic computer

26 November 2014 Last updated at 16:43

A project to recreate one of Britain's pioneering computers has reached a key milestone.

The first recreated parts of the re-built Edsac machine have been switched on at The National Museum of Computing.

The Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator first ran in 1949 and was created to serve scientists at Cambridge University.

Few parts and plans were left of the original which has made the job of recreating the machine a difficult one.

"We don't have blueprints to follow, so to create an authentic Edsac we have to adopt a 1940s mindset to re-engineer and redesign the machine," said Andrew Herbert, leader of the recreation effort.

Students who worked with Edsac's creators have been helping to guide the project, said Mr Herbert.

"We face the same challenges as those remarkable pioneers who succeeded in building a machine that transformed computing."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-30131447

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[wendy]

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