The Vintage Computer Festival East is a once-a-year museum exhibit in Wall, New Jersey that shows off vacuum tube and transistor computers from the 60s, 70s, and 80s. While our own John Timmer visited the museum several years ago, we were long overdue to check back on the exhibition. VCF’s newest addition made the trip well-worth it.
The incredible piece of big iron you see in the first picture above arrived yesterday. It’s a one-of-a-kind analog computer built for MIT, so it doesn’t really have a name or model number. Built by George A. Philbrick Researches in 1958, the volunteers at the science center have just taken to calling it “George.”
Fascinating.
I liked the model of the ‘Mobile Computer’. It is very similar to one of the TWO trucks used to house the RAF GNAT Flight Simulator. One housed the Computer and the other the simulator complete with Motion System.
Retired in the early 1970’s but I did some refurb work on one at RAF Valley (Anglesey) while still an apprentice.
If you are not in the US and want to see some even older Computers working then a visit to the UK TNMOC (http://www.tnmoc.org/) is well worth it. You can even visit Bletchley Park and see an Enigma Machine on the same day.
{disclaimer: I am am member of the TNMOC}
I it true that George runs the most recent version of Hurd?