In our modern world, we don’t even give a thought to the tremendous computation power in even the least expensive computers. Here is an interesting look at some of the things one of the very first computer ENIAC could do:

The original press conference announcing the ENIAC was held on 1 February, 1946. The reporters were addressed by Major General Gladeon M. Barnes, head of Research and Development Service of the Office of the Chief of Ordnance, Eckert, Mauchly, Brainerd, and Goldstine. Arthur Burks and Kite Sharpless conducted a formal ENIAC demonstration showing five simple problems:

  1. 5,000 additions in one second
  2. 50 multiplications in one second
  3. Generation of squares and cubes
  4. Generation of sine and cosine table, to be tabulated
  5. A more complicated computation

Compared to modern computers, this type of demonstration would be considered a total failure. But it is from these early machines that the knowledge to make modern computers were derived.

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