Friden EC130 and Funkschau Demo Computer

Friden EC130 and Funkschau Demonstration Computer

The Friden EC130 from 1964 was the world’s first fully electronic desktop calculator.

Built from discrete components (transistors, diodes, resistors), the calculator used an oscilloscope tube to display the four numbers of the RPN-based calculator.
The numbers were stored using ultrasonic delay line memory.
The technology used was neither binary nor decimal but n-based:
A “3” had three pulses in sequence, an “8” had eight pulses, and so on.

 

Demonstration Computer

Interest in digital electronics is by no means new.

As early as 1968, Fritz Uehlinger built a simple digital desktop calculator based on plans from the Funkschau magazine, using components from IBM mainframes that had just begun to be scrapped at the time.