SAGE operator station
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Computers
SAGE -- Semi-Automatic Ground Environment -- linked hundreds of radar stations
in the United States and Canada in the first large-scale computer
communications network. An operator directed actions by touching a light gun
to the screen.
The air defense system operated on the AN/FSQ-7 computer (known as Whirlwind II
during its development at MIT) as its central computer. Each computer used a
full megawatt of power to drive its 55,000 vacuum tubes, 175,000 diodes and
13,000 transistors.
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