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Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

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Re: Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

#41

Post by IAmBroom »

benj111 wrote: post #24
ranger_danger wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The last name "Goto" in this case is actually read Gotou (ごとう), but romanization methods are their own flamewar. There's much less emphasis put on the "go" part than the "tou", so pronunciation doesn't actually sound anything like the English word "goto" at all. Imagine the spanish word gato. Now elongate the "to", and change the ga to go, and you're close.

TBF, do we actually know how goto the statement was intended to be pronounced? It's like saying Bob Gif is pronounced with a J so sounds nothing like the file format.....

Yes, there is only one reasonable pronunciation of the Fortran code word which is an amalgam of the English words "go to".

GIF is an initialism, with no comparable basis.

Re: Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

#42

Post by numpad0 »

leoc wrote: post #21
HPsquared wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also GotoBLAS, developed by Kazushige Goto. I wonder if they have any relation or if it's a relatively common name.

Very common in Japan, it seems: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Got%C5%8D_(surname) . (Confusingly there is both a Mariko Goto who used to be the singer in a band named Midori and a Japanese-American violinist named Midori Goto.)

Allegedly 35th most common according to some random website[1][2]

1: https://myoji-yurai.net/searchResult.htm?myojiKanji=%E5%BE%8...

2: https://myoji-yurai.net/prefectureRanking.htm

Re: Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

#43

Post by Animats »

kens wrote: post #39

The history of computing is usually described as a nice progression from vacuum tubes to transistors and then ICs. But parametrons are only one of the many forgotten technologies that popped up along the way. Magnetic core logic such as transfluxors was used in several computers. Superconducting cryotrons were going to revolutionize computers. Tunnel-diode logic was also briefly the wave of the future. Other signific…

Right. So many things were tried in the 1950s. There was a lot of interest in nonlinear magnetic devices. UNIVAC had magnetic amplifiers in their "Solid State" computer (1958).

Magnetic devices have the nice property that there's no wear-out mechanism. They're just coils and magnetic materials. They just keep going, for many decades. The Bell System loved nonlinear magnetic devices. There were lots of them, usually potted inside little grey boxes. Here's one of many on eBay.[1]

[1] https://www.ebay.com/itm/318704409860

Re: Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

#44

Post by fifilura »

chuckadams wrote: post #29
tiazumdove wrote: post #13

The quantum flux parametron is a really fascinating design and I always wondered why no one talks about it. You can get to GHz range easily and computing will be adiabatic. Its based on Josephson-junctions so you need to provide very low temperatures. I always thought it was a more promising next gen compute technology than the current quantum computers. Especially when you get to write your own SQUIDs in a SEM. Its…

"Quantum Flux Parametron" is also the most awesomest sci-fi sounding name, straight out of Buck Rogers.

Or back to the future.

Re: Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

#45

Post by xenadu02 »

sixtyj wrote: post #2

> In 1954, Eiichi Goto invented the parametron, a logic device leveraging nonlinear parametric oscillation with two ferrite cores. Unlike the vacuum tube and early transistor circuits prevalent at the time, the parametron offered remarkable stability, requiring minimal maintenance compared to vacuum tubes with short lifetime and costing significantly less than both vacuum tubes and nascent transistors. Its simplicity…

I think that overstates the case for the parametron though.

Even compared to contemporary vacuum tubes they were slower. Contemporary bleeding edge vacuum tube computers could reach Mhz frequencies. Parametrons were 10-15kHz.

The supposed power benefits depended on state. At idle they were significantly more efficient but the more work they did and the faster you tried to run them the exponentially more electricity they required (and heat they generated).

Lastly because the early ones were lower frequency they required physically larger inductors. Contemporary vacuum tube computers took up similar amounts of space due to cooling constraints but parametrons were bulky in ways you couldn't fix.

Parametrons were a dead-end technology almost from the get-go due to physical scaling limits. Even the earliest use of discrete transistors blew them out of the water beyond any hope that some magical physical scaling would rescue them.

Abandoned technologies are usually abandoned for very good reasons not just because they happened to lose the race or get backed by the wrong companies. No amount of investment was ever going to help parametrons catch up with transistors - just as no amount of investment was going to help vacuum tubes catch up either.

Re: Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

#46

Post by SoftTalker »

> vacuum tubes had relatively short lifetime

I see this a lot and I'm sure it's true but my dad had some vacuum tube HiFi setup that he'd had since college and decades later it all still worked.

I guess when there are hundreds or thousands of tubes in a computer even a fairly small chance of failure will end up happening often.

Re: Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

#47

Post by vanderZwan »

tiazumdove wrote: post #13

The quantum flux parametron is a really fascinating design and I always wondered why no one talks about it. You can get to GHz range easily and computing will be adiabatic. Its based on Josephson-junctions so you need to provide very low temperatures. I always thought it was a more promising next gen compute technology than the current quantum computers. Especially when you get to write your own SQUIDs in a SEM. Its…

I don't know much about other quantum computers, so maybe this is a common feature of them, but isn't another interesting thing about this design that it would do reversible computing, making it potentially very low in energy consumption? Or is that what "adiabatic" is a shorthand for in this context?

Re: Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

#48

Post by ahartmetz »

Animats wrote: post #43
kens wrote: post #39

The history of computing is usually described as a nice progression from vacuum tubes to transistors and then ICs. But parametrons are only one of the many forgotten technologies that popped up along the way. Magnetic core logic such as transfluxors was used in several computers. Superconducting cryotrons were going to revolutionize computers. Tunnel-diode logic was also briefly the wave of the future. Other signific…

Right. So many things were tried in the 1950s. There was a lot of interest in nonlinear magnetic devices. UNIVAC had magnetic amplifiers in their "Solid State" computer (1958). Magnetic devices have the nice property that there's no wear-out mechanism. They're just coils and magnetic materials. They just keep going, for many decades. The Bell System loved nonlinear magnetic devices. There were lots of them, usually p…

Reportedly (English Wikipedia + other sources I forgot), the popularity of magnetic amplifiers in the US after WW2 had something to do with reverse engineering German weapon systems where such amplifiers were widely used and had received a corresponding amount of engineering work. They were great at the time unless you needed high bandwidth or light weight.

Re: Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

#49

Post by ahartmetz »

adrian_b wrote: post #30
mikewarot wrote: post #25

Meanwhile, in the US, the Univac Solid State computer[1] used similar principles in its patented[3] "Solid State Logic"[2], and was also released in 1958. My understanding is that the magnetic amplifiers used in the V2 rocket kicked off a lot of interesting uses of magnetic cores. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNIVAC_Solid_State [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_logic [3] https://patents.google.com/paten…

During WWII, Germany used magnetic amplifiers in many different kinds of military equipment, because they had the advantage of being much more rugged and reliable than the electronic devices available at that time. After WWII, the technology of magnetic amplifiers was one of many technologies that USA took from Germany and provided to US companies (like also the Soviet Union did with their part of Germany, but while…

The US were much more focused on "kidnapping" and/or incentivizing (it was often both) the scientists and engineers while the USSR just took the dead materials. The US reaped much greater benefits.

Re: Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes

#50

Post by [deleted] »

xenadu02 wrote: post #45
sixtyj wrote: post #2

> In 1954, Eiichi Goto invented the parametron, a logic device leveraging nonlinear parametric oscillation with two ferrite cores. Unlike the vacuum tube and early transistor circuits prevalent at the time, the parametron offered remarkable stability, requiring minimal maintenance compared to vacuum tubes with short lifetime and costing significantly less than both vacuum tubes and nascent transistors. Its simplicity…

I think that overstates the case for the parametron though. Even compared to contemporary vacuum tubes they were slower. Contemporary bleeding edge vacuum tube computers could reach Mhz frequencies. Parametrons were 10-15kHz. The supposed power benefits depended on state. At idle they were significantly more efficient but the more work they did and the faster you tried to run them the exponentially more electricity t…

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