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From: chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com (Chuck Musciano)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: re: UNIX
Message-ID: <4876@trantor.harris-atd.com>
Date: 14 Nov 90 20:46:56 GMT
References: <11613@alice.att.com> <4868@trantor.harris-atd.com>
Sender: news@trantor.harris-atd.com
Reply-To: chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com (Chuck Musciano)
Organization: Advanced Technology Dept, Harris Corp, Melbourne, FL
Lines: 31

In article <4868@trantor.harris-atd.com>, I write:
> And to keep this
> thread valid for comp.arch, what were David Letterman's Top Ten computer
> architectures?

And Ed Borasky sends me:

Ed Borasky's Top Ten Computer Architectures:

1. Babbage's Analytical Engine (first computer)
2. The IAS machines (ILLIAC I, JOHHNIAC, etc. -- the 
   Von Neumann/Goldstine/Burks designs)
3. The IBM 7030 (STRETCH) -- the first supercomputer
4. System/360 -- the first GENERAL PURPOSE COMPUTER (not specialized for
   commercial or scientific jobs)
5. The PDP-8 -- the first commercially successful minicomputer
6. The FPS AP-120B -- the best array processor, first 
   LONG INSTRUCTION WORD machine
7. The Cray X-MP -- the most successful and best TRUE SUPERCOMPUTER
8. The Connection machine -- the most innovative massively parallel SIMD
   machine
9. Intel's Touchstone Delta -- the best MIMD design to date.
10. The MOSTEK 6502 -- brains of the Apple 2, Commodore 64 and LOTS of
    video games!

Those are MY nominees; clearly others will have favorites.  Conspicuosly
missing are today's RISC machines (RS/6000, SPARC, MIPS).  If you start
the list at 1980 you would have to include them, but I go back further
than many on the net.

Ed Borasky