The Datatron is a family of

decimal The decimal numeral system (also called the base-ten positional numeral system and denary or decanary) is the standard system for denoting integer and non-integer numbers. It is the extension to non-integer numbers (''decimal fractions'') of th ...

vacuum tube A vacuum tube, electron tube, thermionic valve (British usage), or tube (North America) is a device that controls electric current flow in a high vacuum between electrodes to which an electric voltage, potential difference has been applied. It ...

computer A computer is a machine that can be Computer programming, programmed to automatically Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (''computation''). Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic set ...

s developed by

ElectroData Corporation Sibyl Rock with an ElectroData Datatron computer in 1955 The ElectroData Corporation was a computer company located in Pasadena, California. ElectroData originated as a part of Consolidated Electrodynamics Corporation (CEC), which manufactured ...

and first shipped in 1954. The Datatron was later marketed by

Burroughs Corporation The Burroughs Corporation was a major American manufacturer of business equipment. The company was founded in 1886 as the American Arithmometer Company by William Seward Burroughs I, William Seward Burroughs. The company's history paralleled many ...

after Burroughs acquired ElectroData in 1956. The Burroughs models of this machine were still in use into the 1960s.

History

Consolidated Electrodynamics Corporation (CEC), ElectroData's parent corporation, first pre-announced the Datatron in 1952 as the "CEC 30-201". Known also as CEC 30-203 (ElectroData 203), ElectroData 204 or 205, Burroughs 205 (different names signify the development and addition of new peripherals). The first systems were equipped with an "Electrodata 203" processor and were shipped to the

Jet Propulsion Laboratory The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is a Federally funded research and development centers, federally funded research and development center (FFRDC) in La Cañada Flintridge, California, Crescenta Valley, United States. Founded in 1936 by Cali ...

(JPL) and the

National Bureau of Standards The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is an agency of the United States Department of Commerce whose mission is to promote American innovation and industrial competitiveness. NIST's activities are organized into physical sc ...

(NBS) in 1954. That same year design began on the "30-240" processor, enhanced to support

magnetic tape Magnetic tape is a medium for magnetic storage made of a thin, magnetizable coating on a long, narrow strip of plastic film. It was developed in Germany in 1928, based on the earlier magnetic wire recording from Denmark. Devices that use magnetic ...

. The name "Datatron" was first used in 1955.

Description

The Datatron has a word size of ten decimal digits plus a sign. Character data occupies two digits per character. A

magnetic drum Drum memory was a magnetic data storage device invented by Gustav Tauschek in 1932 in Austria. Drums were widely used in the 1950s and into the 1960s as computer memory. Many early computers, called drum computers or drum machines, used dru ...

is used for memory. The drum rotates at 3570 rotations per minute (RPM) and stores 4000 words on 20 tracks (called ''bands''). It weighed about . A later model, the Burroughs 220, added a small amount of

magnetic core memory In computing, magnetic-core memory is a form of random-access memory. It predominated for roughly 20 years between 1955 and 1975, and is often just called core memory, or, informally, core. Core memory uses toroids (rings) of a hard magneti ...

. A later model, the Datatron 205 was sold by Burroughs as the Burroughs 205.

References

External links

*
Photo of Datatron system at Georgia Institute of Technology in 1959

ElectroData/Burroughs Datatron 205 Emulator
1950s computers Vacuum tube computers Decimal computers {{computer hardware stub