Ferranti Mark 1
The Ferranti Mark 1, also known as the Manchester Electronic Computer in its sales literature, and thus sometimes called the Manchester Ferranti, was produced by British electrical engineering firm Ferranti Ltd. It was the world's first commercially available electronic general-purpose stored program digital computer.
Ferranti Mark 1 Star, c. 1953 | |
Also known as | Manchester Electronic Computer Manchester Ferranti |
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Product family | Manchester computers |
Predecessor | Manchester Mark 1 |
Although preceded as a commercial digital computer by the BINAC and the Z4, the Z4 was electromechanical and lacked software programmability, while BINAC never operated successfully after delivery
The Ferranti Mark 1 was "the tidied up and commercialised version of the Manchester Mark I". The first machine was delivered to the Victoria University of Manchester in February 1951 (publicly demonstrated in July) ahead of the UNIVAC I which was delivered to the United States Census Bureau in late December 1952, having been sold on 31 March 1951.