4.4 Technologies1961
University of Pisa
The main instrument of the CEP were vacuum tubes, similar to lightbulbs, electronic components capable of amplifying and directing current. They were relatively fragile and heated up a lot: the computer used an air cooling system.
As a programming language, the CEP used Fortran, in addition to its own machine language. It was capable of performing 67.000 additions per second.
From an architectural point of view, it was a Von Neumann machine: instructions and data shared the same memory space.
Near the entrance to the room there is a functioning reconstruction of a circuit with original pieces of the CEP: it is a six-bit full-adder, which can be used in the presence of guides.