Thursday, November 11, 2004

UNIVAC will conquer all!

Do you ever sit around wondering what a state-of-the-art home computer would look like in 1954? You know, the kind Blofeld and Dr. Strangelove would use to design their doomsday devices? Well, thanks to this image, which I got from Susan Froebel, wonder no more:

RAND Corp. home computer, 1954


Boy, that RAND Corporation was way ahead of its time. Even equipped the computer with a steering wheel, so that users can take it with them on road trips. I can only hope it came with an imperious speech synthesizer that said cool things like, "Die, puny humans!" or, "Hah! I've removed your mouth--let's see you scream now!"

Now Playing: George Strait Strait Out of the Box
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1 comment:

  1. Anonymous12:40 PM

    not really

    taken from metafilter, sept 19:
    http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/35702

    I almost hate to do this....almost. It's actually the maneuvering room of a US Navy nuclear submarine, circa 1960's. The original is a photo from the Smithsonian, and this pic is a result (I'm pretty sure) of a Fark PS contest a couple weeks ago. The wheel is the steam throttle valve for the propulsion turbines.
    Bonus points awarded to psmealy and Singular for their guesses.

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