Rain centers
| Rain centers
|
|
|---|---|
 |
|
| legal form | |
| founding | 1952 |
| resolution | 1989 |
| Seat | Denmark |
| Branch | Computer production |
Regnecentralen was the first Danish computer manufacturer . The company built a computer using vacuum tubes from 1957 and various models of the GIER computer with transistors from 1962 . Since only this latter type of computer was known in Germany, the eight German branches of A / S Regnecentralen were managed under the umbrella of Gier Electronics GmbH . From the mid-1960s, the company brought a large number of other computer models onto the market, all of which were designated with RC and a number - mostly four-digit. Regnecentralen was also known beyond Denmark for its paper tape readers , for which the company was a world leader.
history
In 1947, the Danish Academy of Technical Sciences set up a working group to monitor the development of computers abroad for government, military, industry and science . In 1952 this working group was transformed into a computer service bureau called Regnecentralen (translated data center ) in order to keep up with the development of data processing in other countries. The head of the facility was Niels Ivar Bech. Regnecentralen had access to the drafts for a Swedish computer BESK , which had been developed by a Swedish "mathematics machines" working group. Bech decided that Denmark should develop the BESK further. For this purpose, in October 1955, the computer service office was converted into a stock corporation A / S Regnecentralen with capital from the Marshall Plan . In 1958 the computer DASK ( D ansk A lgoritmisk S ekvens K alkulator, Danish algorithmic sequence calculator ) was ready. In 1959, Regnecentralen joined the ALCOR group, an association of computer manufacturers as well as universities and research institutions with the aim of implementing Algol as uniformly as possible on computers from different manufacturers. This made the DASK one of the first computers that could work with the ALGOL programming language . This was mainly thanks to the rain control center employee Peter Naur .
From 1960 developed Regnecentralen the DASK successor GREED (short for G eodætisk I nstitute E lektroniske R egnemaskine, Calculator of geodetic Institute after the first customer for this product), were used in which, instead of vacuum tubes transistors. About 60 pieces of this machine were made, he was also known outside Denmark, sometimes even in the CMEA exports -space. This computer, too, was strongly fixated on ALGOL as a programming language and was therefore mainly to be found in the academic environment.
In 1963, Regnecentralen launched the RC2000 punched tape reader, which was considered the fastest in the world with a reading speed of 2000 characters per second and which was marketed as an OEM device by many other computer manufacturers .
In the following years, Regnecentralen brought various other computer systems onto the market, including process computers , which were particularly successful in telecommunications companies, as well as PC-like devices. A system was also presented that was specially designed for the UNIX operating system .
This led to strong growth in the company until 1980, which at that time employed around 800 people. After that, Regnecentralen could no longer keep up with the accelerating technical development. In 1989 the company was taken over by the British ICL . In 1993 the company name (company) was no longer continued.
computer
- DASK, a 40-bit computer with 1 K-words main memory as magnetic core memory with a cycle time of 5 µs and 8 K words background memory on a magnetic drum . The device worked with 2500 vacuum tubes and required about 15 kW of electrical power with a weight of about 3.5 tons.
- GIER, a redesign of the DASK in discrete transistor technology, the drum memory was enlarged by 50%, there was a magnetic disk memory with a capacity of around 2 Mbytes and an additional core memory of 4 K words as a buffer between the main memory on the one hand and the drum, magnetic disk or magnetic tape recorder (Manufacturer Ampex ) on the other hand.
- RC4000, a 24-bit computer developed in 1966/67. Per Brinch Hansen , who introduced innovative operating system concepts, played a key role in the development .
- RC6000
- RC7000, a license replica of the Nova from Data General in a housing from Regnecentralen
- RC8000, an "application-compatible" successor to the RC4000, also a 24-bit computer
- RC9000, a computer introduced in 1988 with a processor from MIPS Technologies that was shipped with the UNIX operating system (comparable to the Ultrix systems from DEC )
- RC700 Piccolo, PC with Zilog Z80A CPU
- RC759 Piccoline, PC with Intel 80186 CPU
Peripherals
- RC2000 tape reader (1963, reading speed 2000 characters per second)
- RC2500 punch tape reader (1971/72, reading speed 2500 characters per second)
- RC500 tape reader (1972/73, low price model, reading speed 500 characters per second)
Web links
- Danish Association for the History of Data Processing (in Danish and English)