miller@loral.UUCP (David P. Miller) (02/22/86)
Computer Trivia tm., by GAMEBRAINS tm. poses a question: 1. Which was the first computer to use magnetic disks ?. A: Manchester University's "ATLAS". My question is: Was it really the ATLAS or was it IBM's STRECH ?. Maybe some old timers out there can help me out with this question. Thanks in advanced, BIG DAVE. -- David P. Miller - Loral Instrumentation. / USUAL \ sdcsvax!sdcc3!loral!miller \ DISCLAIMER / ******************************************************************************** "Sticks and stones may hurt my bones but words ......................."
hugh@hcrvx1.UUCP (Hugh Redelmeier) (02/25/86)
In article <1046@loral.UUCP> miller@loral.UUCP (David P. Miller) writes: >Computer Trivia tm., by GAMEBRAINS tm. poses a question: > > 1. Which was the first computer to use magnetic disks ?. > > A: Manchester University's "ATLAS". > >My question is: Was it really the ATLAS or was it IBM's STRECH ?. Maybe some old >timers out there can help me out with this question. All this is from my (faulty) memory. ATLAS didn't have a disk. IBM (!) invented the disk. The first product with it was the IBM 305 RAMAC (RAndoM ACcess). The drum had been around for a while. Manchester did invent some interesting things: Williams tubes (for main memory; used in the IBM 701; obsoleted by Jay Forrester's core memory). Index registers ("B-lines"). Pages (first on the ATLAS). Paging (first on the TITAN (second version of ATLAS)). Micro-programming. STRETCH did have some novel things: the first BYTE (terminology). Pipe-lining.