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From: Tim Rentsch <tr.17687@z991.linuxsc.com>
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: Short Vectors Versus Long Vectors
Date: Tue, 30 Apr 2024 23:58:16 -0700
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Thomas Koenig <tkoenig@netcologne.de> writes:

> Tim Rentsch <tr.17687@z991.linuxsc.com> schrieb:
>
>> Thomas Koenig <tkoenig@netcologne.de> writes:
>>
>>> John Savard <quadibloc@servername.invalid> schrieb:
>>>
>>>> On Thu, 25 Apr 2024 05:39:55 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D'Oliveiro
>>>> <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On Wed, 24 Apr 2024 23:10:47 -0600, John Savard wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> One of the things that those supercomputers that _do_ include
>>>>>> GPUs are praised for is being energy-efficient.
>>>>>
>>>>> That I never heard before.  I heard it in relation to ARM CPUs,
>>>>> yes, GPUs, no.
>>>>
>>>> Here's one example of an item about this:
>>>>
>>>> https://www.infoworld.com/article/2627720/
>>>>       gpus-boost-energy-efficiency-in-supercomputers.html
>>>
>>> Compared the late 1950s, was the total energy consumption by
>>> computers higher or lower than today? :-)
>>
>> Total energy consumption by computers in the 1950s was lower
>> than today by at least a factor of 10.
>
> Undoubtedly true, but I think you're missing quite a few
> orders of magnitude there.

Probably not as many as you think. :)

>> It wouldn't surprise
>> me to discover the energy consumption of just the servers in
>> Amazon Web Services datacenters exceeds the 1950s total, and
>> that's only AWS (reportedly more than 1.4 million servers).
>
> https://smithsonianeducation.org/scitech/carbons/1960.html states
> that, in 1954, there were 15 computers in the US.  That seems low
> (did they only count IBM 701 machines?), but it reportedly went up to
> 17000 in 1964.
>
> Even if you put the number of computers at 100 for the mid-1950s, at
> 100 kW each, you only get 10 MW of power when they ran (wich they often
> didn't; due to maintenance, these early computers seem to have been
> day shift only).

Oh boy, numbers.

First your question asked about the late 1950s, not the mid 1950s.

I estimated between 10,000 and 20,000 computers by the end of
the 1950s, and chose 5 KW as an average consumption.  In those
days computers were big.  Probably the estimate for number of
machines is a bit on the high side, and the average consumption
is a bit on the low side.  I'm only estimating.

The most popular computer in the 1950s was the IBM 650.  2,000
units sold (or in some cases given away).

In contrast, the LGP-30 turned out only 500 units, at a mere
1500 W each.

Towards the end of the 1950s both the IBM 1620 and the IBM 1401
came out.  Of course none of either of these were delivered
until the 1960s, but the IBM 1401 delivered 10,000 units all
on its own.

I looked up a few other IBM models, didn't get any unit numbers on
any of them.  I didn't even try to look up models or numbers of
units from other manufacturers (not counting the LGP-30, since I
happened to have a wikipedia page open already for that).  But
based on just the number of different IBM models, and knowing that
the 650 produced 2,000 units, and keeping in mind the number of
different computer manufacturers at that time, suggests that 10,000
systems overall is a plausible guess.

Also there is a noteworthy computer system developed in the 1950s
that is often overlooked.  Only 24 units were installed.  Each
installation occupied 22,000 square feet, weighed 250 tons, had
60,000 tubes, and used 3 MW.  So that's 72 MW all by itself (to be
fair some parts were turned off at times for maintenance, but at
least half of each installation was up at all times).

I did a very different kind of calculation to estimate how much
power is used in today's computers.  The result was more than
ten times as much, but less than 100 times as much.  Remember,
I'm just estimating.  But I had enough confidence in the estimates
to say at least a factor of 10, which seems more than adequate to
answer the question asked (and that's all I was doing).

What's the largest computer ever built?  The AN/FSQ-7.  Only 24
installed, for an aggregate weight of 6,000 tons.