Why The First Computers Were Made Out Of Light Bulbs

Comments · 7.9K

• UI

  @uiouio1891 · 3 years ago

  Light bulbs were such a good idea, they became the symbol for good ideas

  31K

• ST

  @Strange_Armour · 1 year ago

  It is shocking to realise that - once upon a time - a machine the size of a school bus could get hot enough to boil an egg but had nowhere near enough processing power to run Tetris.

  402

• LI

  @Life_42 · 3 years ago (edited)

  My mind is constantly blown how far humans have come in the last 100 years.<br><br>Edit: Great to see awesome comments here. The goal is to become a peaceful species to explore the cosmos. Let&apos;s overcome the great filter!

  5.4K

• BM

  @bmanpura · 1 year ago

  These days people are making this in minecraft. What a world.

  94

• JO

  @JonLusk · 3 years ago

  As a Computer Engineer, I would like to thank you for illuminating the origins of my profession. This was an exceptional, historical documentary.

  3.2K

• SO

  @Soul-Burn · 3 years ago

  Interesting trivia: The first &quot;computer bug&quot; was a literal moth stuck in a relay in one of these relay calculators!

  1.3K

• CH

  @charliecarrot · 3 years ago

  I&apos;ve lived my whole life hearing about vacuum tubes and never really knowing how they work. This was an amazing presentation connecting lightbulbs to transistors. I&apos;m stunned.

  2.6K

• MO

  @more-of-a-second · 1 year ago

  So in the future, you can do machine learning in minecraft

  30

• CA

  @caodesignworks2407 · 3 years ago

  Seeing the progress of computers laid out in a timeline is one of the most fascinating things to me. I&apos;ve probably seen/ read the story about a dozen times and it&apos;s still interesting

  1.2K

• NO

  @novuml1690 · 3 years ago

  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FU_YFpfDqqA&amp;t=198">03:18</a><br>THE FULL BRIDGE RECTIFIER!!!

  71

• CR

  @crawfordharris4795 · 2 years ago

  I designed and built my first computer with vacuum tubes in 1957. Being a ham radio operator I knew a little about electronics. Also, I was a lazy math and physics major. There were 2 computers in town. One belonged the TVA. Being a part of the government, I was refused access. The other belonged to the largest bank in town. It took up the entire 3rd floor of one of their buildings downtown. They explained how it worked. Several friends contributed tubes. Large and not exactly cost efficient, it did less than my slide rule. It did give me a bit of a leg up years later in getting a job with an airline as an assembly language core programmer on IBM 360s.

  815

• SP

  @Sparweb_Projects · 1 year ago

  NACA stood for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, not astronautics, as you said at <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FU_YFpfDqqA&amp;t=760">12:40</a>. &nbsp;Astronautics wasn&apos;t possible or anyone&apos;s intended goal when NACA was founded, just before WW1. &nbsp;Surprised to see you guys miss that.

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