Debugging the 1959 IBM 1401 Computer at the Computer History Museum

A little behind the scenes look at what it takes to keep the two giant IBM 1401 “Compusaurs“ running at the computer history museum. Today the tape drives decided not to work. The IBM 1401, introduced in 1959, is one of the first transistorized computers, and certainly the most successful computer of the early 1960’s: by 1965, half of the world’s computers were 1401’s. Only two are known to be still functioning - and here they are. Compared to my humble restorations, this is major hardware and it could not be done by one person alone - it takes a full team of very dedicated people to keep it going, many of them retired IBM engineers that worked on these machines long ago. So once or twice a week, we get together, fire up the beast, and for a day it’s 1960’s engineering all over again.