Chapter 355: When the Destiny of Humanity Changes (Second update, please subscribe)
Many times, a sudden inspiration will change everything.
Inventions are often like this, but Li Yian's invention is not necessarily a sudden inspiration, but standing on the shoulders of giants.
But the shoulders of giants can definitely change everything.
Oxygen steelmaking may seem like an invention worth mentioning, but in history, in 1952, the first original top-blown oxygen converter was born in Austria, and then in just a short period of time, the first top-blown oxygen converter was born in Austria. Within 20 years, the top-blown oxygen converter steelmaking method had eliminated almost all open-hearth steelmaking processes.
It was this invention that made steel cheaper. And it will be further researched and applied in various industries.
A seemingly inconspicuous little invention often changes the world.
But what really changes the world?
People in 1947 had no idea that they were still looking at everything with traditional thinking - steel is the country.
There was absolutely no problem with saying this 47 years ago. In fact, during the reconstruction process of Europe and the confrontation between the Soviet and Eastern blocs and the Western bloc, the latter regarded them as The "black industry" with steel as its core has been placed at a level that affects the fate of the country.
Whenever industrial construction is mentioned, people always say - how much steel, how much coal, how many cars, how many machinery have we produced...
In short, the powerful country in this era is so simple - Just need to pile up and pile up.
All you need to do is build a heavy industrial factory, and then continue to accumulate and replicate. As long as the number is reached, the country will be strong.
In fact, the same is true in Borneo. From the first phase of the steel company's project, to the second phase, and then to the third phase, everything seems to be so simple and everything is so easy.
The country only needs to invest, then establish enterprises, then produce, and then continue to copy, and then it can become a powerful country.
Even sometimes there is no need to consider technical issues.
After all, in many cases, what people see is addition-that is, how much steel, how many factories, and how much production capacity you have. As long as you have more factories and more chimneys, then you will definitely be a big winner.
There are examples of this, such as the United States, which served as the arsenal of the allies during the war. This is the perfect example.
So much so that in the world of 1947, people thought that the world was still the same as it was two years ago, but they did not know that the world had actually changed.
It is different from the industrial revolution brought about by the steam engine. As soon as it came out, the world was shocked by the changes brought about by the power of the machine.
When it came out, the world... was not even destined to it.
It... just saves some electricity.
It was the transistor, when it first came out.
That's it, no one can realize what changes the small transistor will bring to mankind.
Because a transistor is just an electronic component. What is the difference between it and a vacuum tube?
Almost everyone thinks so.
Mattare’s invention of the transistor didn’t seem like a big deal.
“Not only the power consumption is very low, but the lifespan is also very long!”
After getting the test results of “transistron”, Chu Ze was a little uneasy. In fact, in the past For a year and a half, in addition to the theoretical results that attracted British and American colleagues like a sponge, he was perfecting the design of the computer.
“Although the use of electron tubes can further improve its performance compared to electromagnetic relay computers, the life of electron tubes is short and the failure rate is high. From an engineering point of view, as the number of electron tubes accumulates, its failure rate It is also increasing. According to calculations, if 4,000 electron tubes are used, it will happen at least dozens of times every day. ”
Although computers have not yet been actually manufactured, with solid engineering experience, Chu Ze came to the conclusion that the reliability of electron tube computers is poor. In fact, this is precisely the biggest shortcoming of electron tube computers - they are large in size, unstable in operation, and extremely power-consuming. . ENIAC burns out several tubes every day, requiring maintenance personnel to locate the fault point among 18,000 tubes, spending half the time repairing it. After coming to this conclusion, Zuse began to think of ways to design redundancy to ensure that the computer could still work normally when it malfunctioned.
It was at this time that the "transistron" mentioned in the "Physical Journal" caught his attention. He immediately reported to Taiping University in the name of the Department of Physics of Nanyang University. The university purchased 100 "transistrons," or transistors.
Chu Ze was so shocked by the results of the experiment that he immediately overturned the previous design and determined to redesign the computer.
“We’re going to make computers out of it!”
Raising the "transistron" in his hand, Chu Ze said excitedly.
"It is the future of computers!"
"Teacher, is this okay?"
Jiang Bingyi was shocked by the teacher's decision.
As a senior member of the project team, he was said to be a student, but when he was in Tangshan, he was a professor at a vocational college. Compared with other students, he seemed more cautious.
"Many people are waiting for our results."
Jiang Bingyi's worry made Chu Ze stunned. He turned to look at Zhang Tianqi, who had always been responsible for external liaison.
"The school did not supervise us, teacher."
His answer made Chu Ze take a deep breath and said.
"Okay, I have decided. If I need an explanation, I will explain it to the school. What we need now is... about 1,000 "transistrons". Let's negotiate with the Taiping Laboratory and see what they have When can we supply it at the shortest possible time? Then, gentlemen..."
Now he is even glad that he did not turn the funds into electronic tubes before.
Looking around, Chu Ze said.
“Now, we have to start our own work.”
In the following days, just like when he was rubbing the Z1 and Z2 computers at home, Chu Ze put his hands on the laboratory It became his home. When he was sleepy, he would take a rest on the sofa in the office. The same was true for the project team members Jiang Bingyi, Zhang Tianqi and others, but they just slept on the folding camp bed.
It is a process from overthrowing the old design drawings to designing new ones, and the "transistron" also needs to be tested. In this way, in the next few months, ten people in this laboratory Several people have been busy there, testing, making drawings, and overturning the drawings until they are finalized.
It was not until Christmas Eve that the drawings were finally finalized. At the same time, Taiping University also delivered 1,000 "transistrons" - this was the largest order they had ever received.
In the next few days, people in the laboratory were still busy, almost to the point of sleeplessness, but their efforts were worth it. At the end of 1947, the world The first transistor electronic computer was finally born!
In the evening, Chu Ze said.
"Calculation time, December 30, 8:12 pm, Z5 started inputting instructions."
Jiang Bingyi then stuffed a 35mm punched piece of paper into the machine, and the calculation was done by punching The punched paper reads the instructions, and the results are output onto the paper using an electric typewriter or punched paper tape.
The Z5 computer is made entirely of transistors. It is equipped with 800 transistors. It makes very little noise when running and consumes only a negligible power. It only has a power of 300 watts and occupies less than 0.5 cubic meters.
But just in the blink of an eye, the calculation results were obtained. It should be said that there is no need to blink, because his addition calculation speed has reached an astonishing 100,000 times or more, so that when the results came out, people simply couldn’t I dare to believe this result. After all, the Z4 invented by Chu Ze can only perform 10 addition operations per second. In other words, its computing speed suddenly increased by 10,000 times.
How could such a result not be shocking!
In the following time, they continued to test, from the simplest addition calculations to very complex calculations. Throughout the night, they kept testing and testing the machine. Limit...
(End of this chapter)