What programming could be done with the computer and what is the highest level of interface that could be achieved?

  • CookieOfFortune@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Babbage’s analytical engine is estimated to weigh about 4 tons. Let’s say it’s equivalent to 10k transistor s to have the same single cycle capability of a modern 100b transistor CPU, you’d need 4 million tons. Also this would probably be impossible to run quickly, while a modern CPU can run billions of times per second. If you were to parallelize to make up the difference to run once per second, you’d need say 4 trillion tons, which is more than our entire iron reserves.

    Point being even with this extremely rough calculation there are huge scale issues.