Computer history: Workstations and PCs (1990 – 1994)
The explosive use of workstations and PCs
At the end of 1991, TNO acquired a cluster of workstations for software development with Teamwork software. A SUN 4/75s central server with 16 Mbytes of memory and a 1.3 Gbyte SCSI disk was purchased.
The number of UNIX workstations at TNO Waalsdorp grew rapidly in the early 1990s:
|
Year |
DAZIX |
DEC |
HP |
MIPS/SGI |
SUN |
Total |
|
1991 |
8 |
19 |
5 |
0 |
54 |
86 |
|
1992 |
0 |
22 |
5 |
2 |
83 |
112 |
|
1993 |
0 |
16 |
5 |
4 |
95 |
120 |
|
1994 |
0 |
19 |
5 |
7 |
106 |
137 |
The number of PCs doubled in a period of two years. At that time we calculated that more than 2.5 keyboards per employee were present at the Laboratory. Partly this was caused by not returning old equipment.
A problem that became increasingly acute was computer virus infections. The policy was made to tackle the problem Laboratory-wide. In the course of 1993, a ‘nomad employee’ travelled from room to room in the Laboratory and provided each PC with an anti-virus package. After installation, automatic updates could be provided via the network to keep the virus protection up to date. The installation of the 500th antivirus package was celebrated by carrying out the work in a ‘first aid coat’ and issuing a certificate to the lucky PC user.
