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Thread ID: 53533	2005-01-20 07:35:00	Computer used on a Boeing 747	Misty (368)	PC World Chat

Post ID	Timestamp	Content	User
316061	2005-01-20 16:38:00	A friend of mine who captains Boeing 747's says that he thinks that the power of the computer that the 747 uses (ie for the instrument panel etc) is only about equivalent to the old 486 PC. He says that is all that seems to be needed. Scary though !!! Misty :eek: We've got a washing machine with a computer about the size of a match box.It does more work than the pile of boxes in front of me. :D It has replaced a woman working all day in a hot steamy laundry. Just press a couple of buttons and forget it. Isn't sceince wonderful. Jack	JJJJJ (528)
316062	2005-01-20 23:06:00	We never went to the moon. Don't you watch the conspiracy shows? :rolleyes: hes got a point there were all talking about a nasa computer that may have never existed	sambaird (47)
316063	2005-01-21 04:57:00	Safari from a quick read seems pretty clued up. I have canvassed my friend by showing him the thread and he says - The 747 has two flight managment computers. Only one runs the aircraft at any given time. Normally the left one. I don't know what the specs are, but judging by the time it takes to do basic calculations I'm not sure if they are as bright as a 486. But then for a computer the problems aren't difficult. Bearing/distance, time/speed/distance, wind calculation, basic aircraft performance taking into account weight, wind, etc. All very basic and a 486 would eat it for lunch. Seems pretty clear to me ! Misty :)	Misty (368)
316064	2005-01-21 06:33:00	Thats fair enough if you are just talking about FMC's and the speed they do the calculations, and I am not disputing how fast they display the information on the CDU. To do to all the calculations they have to gather information from other sources and computers and they are not a standalone computer as you know it so it is hard to compare it with anything. The only reason I responded was that you mentioned Instrument Panel (in fact the Flight Management Computer Display you now mention is not even on the instrument panel so you can see I was confused about what you were referring to) and I was just pointing out there are many imputs to the various controls and indications from other computers and the FMC's require input from some of these as well to do its calculations. Some other computers that give control and indication are - Central Air Data Computer Flight Director Computer Auto Throttle Computer Yaw Danper Computer Roll Computer Pitch Computer I don't disagree with anything your friend has said, he is the Captain and obviously knows what he is talking about.	Safari (3993)
316065	2005-01-22 02:08:00	You don't need much of a computer to fly . People can do it . The Space Shuttle computers are very small . They will hold only one "flight phase" at a time, so before going to a new phase, the appropriate programme is loaded from a tape drive . They will probably still carry an extra "get you home" computer . That's one which isn't plugged in unless it's needed . It's loaded before launch with the code to land the Shuttle . (It can't handle holes in the insulation and melted wings . ) The control system works on a 40 ms clock . Mesurements from sensors are fed in on one tick, the control outputs go out on the next . That's 25 "operations" a second . The very first launch was held up for a couple of hours . Some of the extensive testing had left the In/Out toggle (40 ms clock) in the wrong state . Most of the two hours was spent convincing the managers that this "fault" (which had been trapped) could be fixed by the highly technical operation of turning the computer off then on again . Of course there's no operating system to clog up memory, introduce errors, and slow things down generally . There's a programme loader . The code is written carefully . It is checked thoroughly . It's small, it's very reliable . There have been no errors found .	Graham L (2)
316066	2005-01-22 09:25:00	Cassini-Huygens Probe that has just landed on Titan (one of saturns moons) must have a pre windows 98 on board not to mention their imaging gear.	Gerrypics (6932)
316067	2005-01-22 09:56:00	Cassini-Huygens Probe that has just landed on Titan (one of saturns moons) must have a pre windows 98 on board not to mention their imaging gear. NASA would nuke itself before putting that poor software on any of their computers. That probe would have been dead in space about 30mins after launch with Win98 on it. 5mins if it was WinME.	E|im (87)
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