On Wed, 05 Dec 2007 02:50:25 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

On Tue, 4 Dec 2007 08:29:22 -0500, "Eisboch" wrote:

http://www.neatorama.com/images/2006...puter-1956.jpg

In September 1956 IBM launched the 305 RAMAC, the first computer with a hard
disk drive(HDD). The HDD weighed over a ton and stored 5MB of data.

That's not a typo ..... 5MB of data.

If I remember correctly, the ones that DEC and DG built used head
motors that weighed 160 pounds and were made out of cast aluminum.

Damned things were bigger than washing macines.

Had an Acme calculator back in '53. Took up the entire garage and
had to run a 440V service to heat up the tubes.
Probably weighed 8 tons total.
The biggest part was the "keyboard," which had pneumatically
assisted cast iron foot pedals in a 12" steel I-beam framework.
The servo cylinders for the "2" pedal always acted up, so I got a
wrong answer to the grocery list.
Wife convinced me just use paper and pencil so we could put the cars
back in there. Said she was also getting tired of me always having a
crew of ironworkers around to fix the thing. Those were the days, eh?

--Vic