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Computers
Popular Science
Issue: Jun, 1979
Posted in: Automotive, Computers
Posted: 03/28/2011
10 Comments
Car Computers – new electronic know-it-alls (Jun, 1979)

The state of the art has progressed a bit in the last 30 years or so.

Car Computers – new electronic know-it-alls

Get instant mpg, time of arrival, miles to go, and more—at the push of a button
By BILL HAWKINS

You’ve been on the road for hours. The clock says you’re running late, the gas gauge says you’re running low. And there’s a desolate stretch of highway ahead between you and your destination. Should you take the extra time to look for a gas station or do you continue, hoping the lonely roadway is shorter than your fuel supply?

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Popular Science
Issue: Nov, 1979
Posted in: Advertisements, Computers
Tags:
Posted: 03/23/2011
14 Comments
HOME COMPUTERS – MUST LIQUIDATE AT FAR BELOW DEALER COST! (Nov, 1979)

HOME COMPUTERS – MUST LIQUIDATE AT FAR BELOW DEALER COST!

By VIDEOBRAIN, with 4K of ROM, IK of RAM. Expandable up to 8K with slide-in cartridges!

At last! Your own Home Computer System for money management education, family entertainment… NOW at a sensationally low liquidation closeout price! Hooks up quickly to your TV (B&W or color). Even if you never touched a computer before, you can easily master the VideoBrain and put its amazing capabilities to work for you!

Price includes console keyboard, 3 preprogrammed cartridges, 2 joystick controls, RF switch box, AC Power Adapter, instruction manual, 1 year warranty.

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Scientific American
Issue: Dec, 1954
Posted in: Advertisements, Computers
Tags: , ,
Posted: 03/11/2011
No Comments
Operation Thinking Cap (Dec, 1954)

Operation Thinking Cap

It takes more than a slide rule alone, these days, to perform the computations necessary for scientific problems such as those encountered in atmospheric research. The scientist of today, equipped with modern data-gathering devices, is faced with a stupendous data-reduction task which requires extremely high speed computation. That’s why the Univac Scientific electronic computing system (formerly known as the ERA 1103) has proven to be invaluable to scientists and engineers alike.

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Saturday Evening Post
Issue: Nov, 1961
Posted in: Computers
Posted: 02/16/2011
10 Comments
How Smart are Computers? (Nov, 1961)

I wonder what he’d have thought of Watson.

How Smart are Computers?

BY J. R. PIERCE

ACCORDING TO DOCTOR PIERCE: “The chief charm of the computer comes from the mental skill, agility and insight which men called programmers exercise in causing it to solve difficult and fascinating problems. ”
“Though faster, computers are less versatile than human beings, because they are formed of fewer parts. ”
“The principal limiting factor of the computer is human direction in the form of a program which will guide the machine in a given task.”

When I leave my office to confer with the mathematicians at the Bell Labs, I walk along a corridor with a long glass window on the right-hand wall. Through the window I look into a room about ninety feet long and forty feet wide. There I see a digital computer.

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Popular Science
Issue: Oct, 1968
Posted in: Automotive, Computers
Posted: 01/26/2011
1 Comment
Tattletale computer tells driving faults (Oct, 1968)

Tattletale computer tells driving faults

The computer has been adapted to do an important job of youth education—driver training. The new system was engineered by Raytheon for use in the Aetna Drivotrainer [PS, May '53]. It has three elements—simulated cars, a movie screen, and a console for an instructor, all fitted neatly into a classroom in a specially outfitted trailer. Monitoring individual student performance, the computer flashes word to the instructor when an error is made in driving down a road on the screen.

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Popular Science
Issue: Nov, 1968
Posted in: Ahead of its time, Computers
Posted: 01/21/2011
6 Comments
Now They’re Printing TRANSISTORS ON PAPER! (Nov, 1968)

I’m not sure what happened with this, but people are now making transistors where paper is actually a functional part of the device.

Now They’re Printing TRANSISTORS ON PAPER!

Flexible circuits printed by machine on paper, aluminum foil, or film may make possible cheap, disposable radios, hi-fi’s, and many other electronic devices.

By W. STEVENSON BACON

Someday soon you may be able to buy a pad of operating electronic circuits just the way you now buy a pad of paper. On its pages will be printed amplifiers, radio receivers, computer circuitry, oscillators—anything you can name. They’ll be so inexpensive you’ll be able to tear them out, use them, and junk them.

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Byte
Issue: Jan, 1983
Posted in: Advertisements, Computers
Tags:
Posted: 12/31/2010
19 Comments
The Smart Sony (Jan, 1983)

The Smart Sony

Introducing the Sony small business computer system. The Sony that shows the top rated programs that help you make smarter business decisions.

The Sony system that’s easy enough for a doctor, lawyer or chief executive to learn to use. Yet smart enough for accounting, billing, inventory word processing and endless other complex, profit oriented chores. It can even talk to other computers, big and small.

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Electronics Illustrated
Issue: Jun, 1960
Posted in: Chemistry, Computers
Posted: 07/30/2010
1 Comment
Electronics Tells The Chemist (Jun, 1960)

unusual compounds find uses because

Electronics Tells The Chemist

By Shirley Motter Linde

THERE are about 750,000 known organic chemical compounds. Less than one percent of these have any known medical or industrial use!

The other 99 percent are a huge potential of untapped applications. They represent hundreds of thousands of chemicals sitting idle on laboratory shelves when they might possibly be useful in curing cancer, fighting viruses, killing insects, giving more gas mileage, making rocket fuels for space vehicles, producing new synthetics, etc.

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Scientific American
Issue: Sep, 1979
Posted in: Advertisements, Computers
Tags: ,
Posted: 07/20/2010
19 Comments
“31,000 student hours later, we still love Apple Computer” (Sep, 1979)

When I was kid I had a subscription where I would get disks full of software from MECC every month. I loved their stuff.

“31,000 student hours later, we still love Apple Computer”

- Dr. Kenneth Brumbaugh. Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium

When the Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium recommended Apple Computer to the state’s school districts—well, it started something big.

Today there are hundreds of Apple Computers in use in 35% of Minnesota’s elementary and secondary schools, and nearly all of the colleges and universities in the state. Most communicate with the Consortium’s CYBER 73 mainframe in a state-wide educational computer network.

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Scientific American
Issue: Nov, 1956
Posted in: Advertisements, Computers
Tags:
Posted: 07/16/2010
3 Comments
Untransistorized Digital Differential Analyzer? (Nov, 1956)

Untransistorized Digital Differential Analyzer?

The abacus has qualities much sought after in today’s electronic computers: ease and reliability of operation, low investment, and minimal maintenance.

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