Posted on 12/07/2004 3:23:34 AM PST by Colosis
ping
Farnsworth tubes?
Stable elements?
What is that stuff?
I must be older.....while a grad student , i wrote a program for an IBM 650 which had NO Ferrite Memory....had a rotating drum used as memory, to be replaced by 704's I believe.....
Was used in the development of the Polaris missile....my program buried the machine....IBM Rep was happy cause they bought a bigger faster replacement.
Hi, Ernest!
The 6SN7 was a dual-triode vacuum tube... a multivibrator ( flip-flop ) switched back & forth from an on to off state when you inputted voltage... the early version of digital versus analog, there was no inbetween state. You used a dual triode for simplicity-- only needed one tube instead of two separate tubes & sockets.
The Farnsworth tube was an infrared detector-- I still have one in my tube box. With the right optics, power, and an infrared light source, you could use it to see in the "dark."
The stable element was one of the big naval secrets, pre-WWII
Prior to that, Nelson's dictum, "only a fool attacks a Fort," was all too true-- ships pitch & roll, forts sit still, so hitting the same location was mainly luck.
The stable element was a gyroscope and electronics that slaved the guns to stay steadily on target. They were used with mechanical computers- all gears & wheels- in the Combat Information Center-- to find solutions to the guns firing problems, and were amazingly accurate considering the era.
The one I had was powered by a small 110VAC motor, and I wish I still had it, for curiousity's sake- I let it slip away when Mom sold the old Island house. Didn't even think about it sitting in Dad's closet 'til the house was long gone.
Wow- I may have one or two left, but I let boxes & boxes go when the old house was sold about 13 years ago.
By the way, the best PDA you could even imagine. Fast, lasts 11 hours on a battery charge, includes a 70 percent size keyboard, not much bigger than a check book, runs Excel, word, onboard modem, fax from it, surf the net, email,(just plug in the jack), or use with cable or wireless using a pcmcia card, CF slot for date backup, color touch screen (easier than a mouse), syncs easily with your compture, all the organizer features you would find in a backwards style PDA (the screen should be horizontal) and no more lugging a lap top.
Thanks whoever invented this thing!
The modem takes up a city block and uses 120,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity.
I bought a new modem last week and it uses half that much electricity!
It sounds like something my wife may have had before she met me. (/sarcam)
Seriously, I saw the picture and still have no idea what the ships steering wheel would be used for. I almost wonder if the picture is some kind of joke because of the steering wheel. I have been using computers of one form or another since the late 1960's and I have never ever seen a steering wheel in a control room! I would have also expected to have seen a TTY of some form in the picture.
Why hasn't my PC got a steering wheel?
BTW, we did a remodel job at RAND in Santa Monica in the late 50s and that think tank was one secure building! Every man had his own guard all day and each door was a double door with an armed guard in between the two.
I carry a K&E (full size) in my truck, still can't give it up!
Hell, that is better than what I saw at some DOE secured sites,....
Apparently we have some photoshop Magic here... apparently the
background comes from the control console of a submarine, and the wheels control some important components, ..... the video and the printer are photoshop addons....
Large wheel controls the turbine forward inlet valve, the small, the reverse.
I have seen docking maneuvers where a "green" OOD has worn out two sailors in a short time trying to get the sub into a slip.
Thanks, see post #154!
Sounds like working for 007. Did the doors make the swish sound, like on star trek, when you walked through... 8^)
So the two Osborne I's I have stored in the basement aren't worth crap then?
Well, it has a nice big steering wheel for driving games. My husband would love it! ;)
...Oh, and another thing. Can you still do rectangular-to-polar conversion on yours?
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