- 1962 computer would have cost £4.2 million pounds to build built today
- Two dedicated engineers have spent nine years resurrecting the machine, which starred as a prop in dozens of TV shows and films including Dr Who and The Man With The Golden Gun
- Team now face the painstaking task of using 27 reels of magnetic tape and 100,000 punch cards to recover the computer’s software
- Machine has roughly the same computing power as a digital watch
A computer thought to be one of the oldest in the world has been brought back to life by two dedicated scientists in a garden shed.
Rod Thomas and Roger Holmes have spent hundreds of hours breathing life into ‘Flossie’, an ICT 1301 mainframe that cost £250,000 – or £4.2million today – in 1962.
Over the last nine years the duo have had to overcome nearly 1,000 problems with the machine to get it working again.
Roger Holmes and Rod Brown with the ticker tape used to program ‘Flossie’ in Roger’s garden shed – which the pair spent nine years rebuilding
The Kent shed where the team rebuilt Flossie over nine years
They now face the painstaking task of using 27 reels of magnetic tape and 100,000 punch cards to recover the computer’s ‘software’.
Despite being 25 square feet and weighing five tons ‘Flossie’ is only 1/10 as powerful as a modern-day smart phone and has roughly the same power as a digital wristwatch.
It featured as a prop in the climax of the 1974 Bond film The Man with the Golden Gun, starring Roger Moore.
The scientists believe they need another six months to recover the computer’s software – which they believe will offer a fascinating insight into the birth of the British computer industry.
But their plans could be scuppered if a new home cannot be found for ‘Flossie’.
The old computer is currently housed in a shed on a farm in Kent, with the owners in the process of selling the property.
All of the data the computer has inside it would fit onto 1/3 of a CD.
HOW FAST IS FLOSSIE?
Flossie’s computing power is roughly equivalent to a digital watch.
The computing power of the huge machine is tiny by modern standards at a miniscule 2kb of memory running at 1mhz speed.
Technology has progressed so much that its 16,000 transistors and 4,000 logic boards could fit onto two 10mm silicon chips today, while its 27 reels of magnetic tape and 100,000 punch cards would fit on less than a third of a CD.
An advertising image of Flossie, an ICT 1301, in the sixties.
The computer’s main purpose was to produce GCE exam results and certificates at
London University in the 1960s.
Rod, 67, and Roger, 59, have spent 2,500 man hours working on breathing life into the machine over the past decade.
Roger, a volunteer of the Computer Preservation Society, said: ‘The technologies in this machine need to be recorded for archaeological reasons.
‘It is important they are available to future British generations.
‘Whether we can start the process to do that is an unknown at the moment.
The computer first featured as a prop in the climax of the 1974 Bond film The Man with the Golden Gun, starring Roger Moore.
As well as featuring in James Bond, the computer was also used as a prop in numerous early episodes of Dr Who and the BBC science fiction series Blake’s 7.
It also appeared in the Italian Job.
However, even in it’s retirement, Flossie has still kept in touch with the TV world – the farm where the computer currently resides was used to film the hit ITV television series The Darling Buds of May.
The 1301 control panel appeared several times in Scaramanga’s lair in the Man with the Golden Gun.
‘We are talking to a couple of places about where it could eventually go.
‘It would be nice if it could end up at the Science Museum or Bletchley Park.
‘I know 1/3 of a CD doesn’t sound like much, but that contains the early years of the British computer industry.
‘Since the 1960s we have lost the race to the Americans, but this is a reminder that there once was a great early British computer industry.
‘The foundation of the early British computer industry is enshrined in this machine.
‘We can’t run it in the winter as it is too cold, in the meantime we are trying to find it another home.’
The 1962 ICT 1301 mainframe computer – the first machine out of the factory – is the only example of second-generation British mainframe that is still in working order.
Where’s the keyboard? Flossie’s main control panel where programmers would use dials and switches to issue commands to the machine
It was bought by a group of students from London University and Roger acquired it from them in the 1970s.
The computing power of the huge machine is tiny by modern standards at a miniscule 2kb of memory running at 1mhz speed.
Technology has progressed so much that its 16,000 transistors and 4,000 logic boards could fit onto two 10mm silicon chips today.
Originally there were 150 of the computers worldwide.
Only four are left but ‘Flossie’ is the only one of the computers which still works.
The remaining three are in New Zealand, France and Cumbria.
As well as featuring in James Bond, the computer was also used as a prop in numerous early episodes of Dr Who and the BBC science fiction series Blake’s 7.
The farm where the computer currently resides was used to film the hit ITV television series The Darling Buds of May.
Source : dailymail.co.uk
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