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The WITCH (Wolverhampton Instrument for Teaching Computation from Harwell), a 61 year old computer was turned back on Tuesday in the UK. It became the world's oldest working computer, first constructed in the 1950's as a part of the atomic research program, weighing about 2.5 tons. The computer has no actual use anymore in modern life except for being on display in a museum for learning purposes. The WITCH has many lights that flash and clattering sounds from all over. The WITCH uses dekatrons instead of binary code like most computers. The contraption could only store 40 8-digit numbers and takes about 5-10 seconds to multiply 2 numbers. The WITCH also uses computer programs on paper tape and has no keyboard nor monitor. I think it is a great idea to revive the WITCH because people can see the oldest computer in the world and historians and other people with the same interests can see and learn about the origins of our devices.
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