ICT 1301 computer

This computer was made in 1962, not of integrated circuits but individual transistors etc. I bought it in 1978. I and another member of the Computer Conservation Society are restoring it.

We are all very familiar with modern computers, but this shows how large (700 square feet), heavy (five tons), noisy, hot and hungry for electrical power (13kVA) the early computers were, their huge cost (about 250,000 pounds) and how much work it took to make them, program them, operate them and feed them with data. In the flesh, it also reminds those who worked on them of the unique smell of mainframe computers. It reminds us how cheap labour of the time was replaced by automation, on one hand freeing up clerks, managers, typists etc to do less boring work, though of course for many, redundancy seemed the end of their careers at the time.

The machine was envisioned by the company (BTM) which made many of the machines which cracked German enigma codes, and at the time the UK was one of the leaders in computer development.

The machine's logic elements were made by GEC Telephones in Coventry.

Later almost all the British computer companies merged and became part of F