CDC 1604
Encyclopedia
The CDC 1604 was a 48-bit
computer designed and manufactured by Seymour Cray
and his team at the Control Data Corporation
. The 1604 is known as the first commercially successful transistorized computer
. Legend has it that the 1604 designation was chosen by adding CDC's first street address (501 Park Avenue) to Cray's former project, the ERA-Univac 1103. A cut-down 24-bit version, designated the CDC 924, was also produced.
The first 1604 was delivered to the US Navy in 1960 for applications supporting major Fleet Operations Control Centers in Hawaii
, London
, and Norfolk, Virginia
. By 1964, over 50 systems were built. The CDC 3000
succeeded the 1604.
A 12-bit minicomputer, called the CDC 160
, was often used as an I/O processor in 1604 systems. A stand-alone version of the 160 called the CDC-160A was, arguably, the first minicomputer.
Each 48-bit word contained two 24-bit instructions. The instruction format was 6-3-15: 6 bits for the operation code, 3 bits for a "designator" (index register for memory access instructions, condition for jump (branch) instructions) and 15 bits for a memory address (or shift count, for shift instructions).
The CPU contained a 48-bit accumulator (A), a 48-bit mask register (Q), a 15-bit program counter (P), and six 15-bit index registers (1-6). Internal integer representation utilized one's complement arithmetic. Internal floating point format was 1-15-32: 1 bit of sign, 15 bits of offset (biased) binary exponent, and 32 bits of binary mantissa.
The most-significant 3 bits of the accumulator were Digital-to-analog converted
and connected to a tube audio amplifier contained in the console. This facility could be used to program audio alerts for the computer operator, or to generate music. Those familiar with the inner workings of the software could often hear what parts of a task were being performed by the CDC 1604.
Company in Findlay, Ohio
. Masquerade was a text mining
program that used syntactic structures underlying text data to mask out words and phrases for searching purposes.
During 1969, Fleet Operations Control Center, Pacific (FOCCPAC at Kunia) on Oahu
in Hawaii
launched an Automated Control Environment (ACE) using a cluster of five CDC 160As to supervise a multi-tasking network of four CDC 1604's.
The Minuteman I was the first U.S. ICBM system to be fielded. There were two entirely separate ground station designs which were developed independently. The smaller, more elegant, single silo design incorporated two redundant CDC 1604 computer systems, each equipped with dual cabinets containing four 200 bpi magnetic tape drives. The computers were used to pre-compute guidance and aiming control information. Results based on current weather and targeting information were downloaded into the missile prior to launch. Model displays of both of these ICBM ground station designs, including block models of the CDC 1604 computers, may be viewed at the Octave Chanute Aerospace Museum
in Rantoul, Illinois.
The third version of the PLATO computer-based educational system was implemented on a CDC 1604-C.
JOVIAL
was used as the CDC 1604's main programming language, while octal
was used to program shared services supported by the CDC 160A. NAVCOSSACT based at the Washington Navy Yard
provided systems and training support.
48-bit
Computers with 48-bit words include CDC 1604 and BESM-6.The IBM AS/400, in its CISC variants, is a 48-bit addressing system. The address size used in logical block addressing was increased to 48 bits with the introduction of ATA-6....
computer designed and manufactured by Seymour Cray
Seymour Cray
Seymour Roger Cray was an American electrical engineer and supercomputer architect who designed a series of computers that were the fastest in the world for decades, and founded Cray Research which would build many of these machines. Called "the father of supercomputing," Cray has been credited...
and his team at the Control Data Corporation
Control Data Corporation
Control Data Corporation was a supercomputer firm. For most of the 1960s, it built the fastest computers in the world by far, only losing that crown in the 1970s after Seymour Cray left the company to found Cray Research, Inc....
. The 1604 is known as the first commercially successful transistorized computer
Transistor computer
A transistor computer is a computer which uses discrete transistors instead of vacuum tubes. The "first generation" of electronic computers used vacuum tubes, which generated large amounts of heat, were bulky, and were unreliable. A "second generation" of computers, through the late 1950s and...
. Legend has it that the 1604 designation was chosen by adding CDC's first street address (501 Park Avenue) to Cray's former project, the ERA-Univac 1103. A cut-down 24-bit version, designated the CDC 924, was also produced.
The first 1604 was delivered to the US Navy in 1960 for applications supporting major Fleet Operations Control Centers in Hawaii
Hawaii
Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...
, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, and Norfolk, Virginia
Norfolk, Virginia
Norfolk is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. With a population of 242,803 as of the 2010 Census, it is Virginia's second-largest city behind neighboring Virginia Beach....
. By 1964, over 50 systems were built. The CDC 3000
CDC 3000
The CDC 3000 series computers from Control Data Corporation were mid-1960s follow-ons to the CDC 1604 and CDC 924 systems. Over time, a range of machines were produced - divided into the 'upper 3000 series' and the 'lower 3000 series'. CDC phased out production of the 3000 series in the early 1970s...
succeeded the 1604.
A 12-bit minicomputer, called the CDC 160
CDC 160A
The CDC 160 and CDC 160-A were 12-bit minicomputers built by Control Data Corporation from 1960 to 1965. The 160 was designed by Seymour Cray - reportedly over a long three-day weekend...
, was often used as an I/O processor in 1604 systems. A stand-alone version of the 160 called the CDC-160A was, arguably, the first minicomputer.
Architecture
Memory in the CDC 1604 consisted of 32K 48-bit words of magnetic core memory with a cycle time of 6.4 microseconds. It was organized as two banks of 16K words each, with odd addresses in one bank and even addresses in the other. The two banks were phased 3.2 microseconds apart, so average effective memory access time was 4.8 microseconds. The computer executed about 100,000 operations per second.Each 48-bit word contained two 24-bit instructions. The instruction format was 6-3-15: 6 bits for the operation code, 3 bits for a "designator" (index register for memory access instructions, condition for jump (branch) instructions) and 15 bits for a memory address (or shift count, for shift instructions).
The CPU contained a 48-bit accumulator (A), a 48-bit mask register (Q), a 15-bit program counter (P), and six 15-bit index registers (1-6). Internal integer representation utilized one's complement arithmetic. Internal floating point format was 1-15-32: 1 bit of sign, 15 bits of offset (biased) binary exponent, and 32 bits of binary mantissa.
The most-significant 3 bits of the accumulator were Digital-to-analog converted
Digital-to-analog converter
In electronics, a digital-to-analog converter is a device that converts a digital code to an analog signal . An analog-to-digital converter performs the reverse operation...
and connected to a tube audio amplifier contained in the console. This facility could be used to program audio alerts for the computer operator, or to generate music. Those familiar with the inner workings of the software could often hear what parts of a task were being performed by the CDC 1604.
Uses and applications
In 1960 one of the first text mining applications, Masquerade, was written for the Marathon OilMarathon Oil
Marathon Oil Corporation is a United States-based oil and natural gas exploration and production company. Principal exploration activities are in the United States, Norway, Equatorial Guinea, Angola and Canada. Principal development activities are in the United States, the United Kingdom, Norway,...
Company in Findlay, Ohio
Findlay, Ohio
As of the census of 2000, there were 38,967 people, 15,905 households, and 10,004 families residing in the city. The population density was 2,266.3 people per square mile . There were 17,152 housing units at an average density of 997.6 per square mile...
. Masquerade was a text mining
Text mining
Text mining, sometimes alternately referred to as text data mining, roughly equivalent to text analytics, refers to the process of deriving high-quality information from text. High-quality information is typically derived through the devising of patterns and trends through means such as...
program that used syntactic structures underlying text data to mask out words and phrases for searching purposes.
During 1969, Fleet Operations Control Center, Pacific (FOCCPAC at Kunia) on Oahu
Oahu
Oahu or Oahu , known as "The Gathering Place", is the third largest of the Hawaiian Islands and most populous of the islands in the U.S. state of Hawaii. The state capital Honolulu is located on the southeast coast...
in Hawaii
Hawaii
Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...
launched an Automated Control Environment (ACE) using a cluster of five CDC 160As to supervise a multi-tasking network of four CDC 1604's.
The Minuteman I was the first U.S. ICBM system to be fielded. There were two entirely separate ground station designs which were developed independently. The smaller, more elegant, single silo design incorporated two redundant CDC 1604 computer systems, each equipped with dual cabinets containing four 200 bpi magnetic tape drives. The computers were used to pre-compute guidance and aiming control information. Results based on current weather and targeting information were downloaded into the missile prior to launch. Model displays of both of these ICBM ground station designs, including block models of the CDC 1604 computers, may be viewed at the Octave Chanute Aerospace Museum
Octave Chanute Aerospace Museum
The Octave Chanute Aerospace Museum, the largest aviation museum in Illinois, occupies part of the grounds of the decommissioned Chanute Air Force Base in Rantoul, Illinois. It and the base were named for Octave Chanute, railroad engineer and aviation pioneer...
in Rantoul, Illinois.
The third version of the PLATO computer-based educational system was implemented on a CDC 1604-C.
JOVIAL
JOVIAL
JOVIAL is a high-order computer programming language similar to ALGOL, but specialized for the development of embedded systems .JOVIAL is an acronym for "Jules Own Version of the International...
was used as the CDC 1604's main programming language, while octal
Octal
The octal numeral system, or oct for short, is the base-8 number system, and uses the digits 0 to 7. Numerals can be made from binary numerals by grouping consecutive binary digits into groups of three...
was used to program shared services supported by the CDC 160A. NAVCOSSACT based at the Washington Navy Yard
Washington Navy Yard
The Washington Navy Yard is the former shipyard and ordnance plant of the United States Navy in Southeast Washington, D.C. It is the oldest shore establishment of the U.S. Navy...
provided systems and training support.
Similar machines
The 1604 design was used by the Soviet nuclear weapons laboratory. Their BESM-6 super computer was designed to be somewhat software compatible with the CDC 1604, but it ran 10 times faster and had additional registers.External links
- Neil R. Lincoln with 18 Control Data Corporation (CDC) engineers on computer architecture and design, Charles Babbage InstituteCharles Babbage InstituteThe Charles Babbage Institute is a research center at the University of Minnesota specializing in the history of information technology, particularly the history since 1935 of digital computing, programming/software, and computer networking....
, University of Minnesota. Engineers include Robert Moe, Wayne Specker, Dennis Grinna, Tom Rowan, Maurice Hutson, Curt Alexander, Don Pagelkopf, Maris Bergmanis, Dolan Toth, Chuck Hawley, Larry Krueger, Mike Pavlov, Dave Resnick, Howard Krohn, Bill Bhend, Kent Steiner, Raymon Kort, and Neil R. Lincoln. Discussion topics include CDC 1604, CDC 6600CDC 6600The CDC 6600 was a mainframe computer from Control Data Corporation, first delivered in 1964. It is generally considered to be the first successful supercomputer, outperforming its fastest predecessor, IBM 7030 Stretch, by about three times...
, CDC 7600CDC 7600The CDC 7600 was the Seymour Cray-designed successor to the CDC 6600, extending Control Data's dominance of the supercomputer field into the 1970s. The 7600 ran at 36.4 MHz and had a 65 Kword primary memory using core and variable-size secondary memory...
, CDC 8600CDC 8600The CDC 8600 was the last of Seymour Cray's supercomputer designs while working for the Control Data Corporation. The "natural successor" to the CDC 6600 and CDC 7600, the 8600 was intended to be about 10 times as fast as the 7600, already the fastest computer on the market.Development started in...
, CDC STAR-100CDC STAR-100The STAR-100 was a vector supercomputer designed, manufactured, and marketed by Control Data Corporation . It was one of the first machines to use a vector processor to improve performance on appropriate scientific applications....
and Seymour CraySeymour CraySeymour Roger Cray was an American electrical engineer and supercomputer architect who designed a series of computers that were the fastest in the world for decades, and founded Cray Research which would build many of these machines. Called "the father of supercomputing," Cray has been credited...
. - Oral history interview with Mike Schumacher, Charles Babbage InstituteCharles Babbage InstituteThe Charles Babbage Institute is a research center at the University of Minnesota specializing in the history of information technology, particularly the history since 1935 of digital computing, programming/software, and computer networking....
, University of Minnesota. Schumacher discusses the development of operating and applications software for the CDC 1604. - On-line copies of CDC 1604 manuals.