Name/Title
1952/09- Scientific American, "The Role of the Computer"Tags
Scientific AmericanDescription
COMPUTER OF THE FUTURE is suggested by this experimental machine built by J. H. Felker of Bell Telephone Laboratories. Instead of vacuum tubes or relays it uses germanium diodes as its logic elements. It also uses the germanium triode, or transistor, as an amplifier. Because these germanium devices are about the size of a pea, a computer utilizing them is much smaller than an equivalent machine employing vacuum tubes or relays. The germanium diodes and triodes also use very little power; the entire computer draws only 5 watts. The machine is capable of multiplying 4,000 16-digit binary numbers a second. One of its interesting features is that each of its 80 transistors is part of an identical plug-in unit (see pages 124 and 125)
