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The history of computing hardware spans the developments from early devices used for simple calculations to today's complex computers, encompassing advancements in both analog and digital technology. The first aids to computation were purely mechanical devices which required the operator to set up the initial values of an elementary arithmetic ...
The Chinese abacus, also known as the suanpan (算盤/算盘, lit. "calculating tray"), comes in various lengths and widths, depending on the operator. It usually has more than seven rods. There are two beads on each rod in the upper deck and five beads each in the bottom one, to represent numbers in a bi-quinary coded decimal-like system
Arab astronomer, Abū Ishāq Ibrāhīm al-Zarqālī (Arzachel) of al-Andalus, invented the Equatorium [citation needed], a mechanical analog computer device used for finding the longitudes and positions of the Moon, Sun and planets without calculation, using a geometrical model to represent the celestial body's mean and anomalistic position.
Napier's bones is a manually operated calculating device created by John Napier of Merchiston, Scotland for the calculation of products and quotients of numbers. The method was based on lattice multiplication, and also called rabdology, a word invented by Napier.
A mechanical calculator, or calculating machine, is a mechanical device used to perform the basic operations of arithmetic automatically, or (historically) a simulation such as an analog computer or a slide rule.
Foreground: 'operational cards', for inputting instructions; background: 'variable cards', for inputting data. Babbage's first attempt at a mechanical computing device, the Difference Engine, was a special-purpose machine designed to tabulate logarithms and trigonometric functions by evaluating finite differences to create approximating ...
The earliest of these calculating punches were electromechanical. Later models employed vacuum tube logic. Electronic modules developed for these units were used in early computers, such as the IBM 650. The Bull Gamma 3 calculator could be attached to tabulating machines, unlike the stand-alone IBM calculators. [54
It was the first calculator that could perform all four basic arithmetic operations. [ 3 ] Its intricate precision gearwork, however, was somewhat beyond the fabrication technology of the time; mechanical problems, in addition to a design flaw in the carry mechanism, prevented the machines from working reliably.