December 11, 2013 at 15:38New exhibition at Computer History Museum brings IBM's 50-year-old computers back to life
The Museum of Computer History, the world's leading organization studying the history of the development of computers and their impact on society, has opened its new exhibition: IBM 1401 Demo Lab.
The main feature of the new exhibition is the reconstruction of one of the most popular computers of all time - the IBM 1401 Data Processing System ( IBM 1401 ). The exhibition accurately restores the 1960s computing center, including rotary hammers, printers, readers, and tape drives.
The IBM 1401 mainframe was introduced to the public in 1959. Traditional methods based on the use of punch cards and mechanical equipment could not cope with the large volume and growing complexity of operations in the world. The IBM 1401 system was an ideal solution, which led to the fact that in 1965 almost half of all computers in the world were IBM 1401.
Two IBM 1401 machines, 45 and 48 years old, were brought back to life by a team of 20 volunteers. These are mainly retired IBM engineers who used to design, manufacture, and support customer systems. Successful restoration is emphasized by the robustness of the structure and the high reliability of mechanical and solid-state components. The restoration took more than 20,000 hours over 10 years.
“Demo Lab connects the past and the future, clearly illustrating what systems were like in the 1960s and how much society has advanced over 50 years of incredible progress.” - John Hollar, Director of the Computer History Museum
Photos from the exhibition can be found here .
