The Datamatic Division of Honeywell announced the H-800 electronic computer in 1958. The first installation occurred in 1960. A total of 89 units were delivered. The H-800 design was part of a family of 48-bit word, three-address instruction format computers that descended from the DATAmatic 1000, which was a joint Honeywell and Raytheon project started in 1955. The 1800 and 1800-II were follow-on designs to the H-800.Mark Smotherman Paper about the Honeywell 800
Data The basic unit of data was a word of 48 bits. This could be divided in several ways: 8 alphanumeric characters of 6 bits each 12 hexadecimal or decimal characters of 4 bits each 16 octal characters of 3 bits each An instruction with four components of 12 bits each: the operation to be performed, and three memory addresses.
Hardware
The Honeywell 800 was a transistorized computer with magnetic-core memory. Its processor used around 6000 discrete transistors and around 30,000 solid-state diodes.Eldon C. Hall, Journey to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Guidance Computer, AIAA, 1996, , page 32 The basic system had: A Central Processor with 16 controlled input/output trunks An Input/Output Control Center (IOCC) with control functions for: A card reader/punch, A high-speed printer Up to four magnetic-tape units A control memory of 256 special registers of 16 bits each A main memory containing four banks of 2048 words.
Extra peripherals could be added running through additional controllers with a theoretical possibility of 56 tape units.
Up to 12 more main memory banks could be added.
A random-access disc system with a capacity of 800 million alphanumeric characters could be added.
Multiprogram control allowed up to eight programs to be sharing the machine, each with its own set of 32 special registers.
A Floating-Point Unit was optionally available. The 48-bit word allowed a seven-bit exponent and 40-bit mantissa. So numbers between 10−78 and 10+76 were possible and precision was 12 decimal places. If the floating point unit was not installed, the floating-point commands were implemented by software simulation.
Peripheral devices included: high-density magnetic tapes, high-speed line printers, fast card and paper tape readers and punches to high-capacity random access magnetic disc memories, optical scanners, self-correcting orthoscanners and data communications devices.Company Sales Manual for the Honeywell 1800
Software Available software included: ARGUS (Automatic Routine Generating and Updating System), an assembly language. FACT (Fully Autom]]atic Compiling Technique), a business compiler. PERT (Program Evaluation and Review Technique), a project management system. COP (Computer Optimization Package), a program testing system. COBOL (COmmon Business Oriented Language), a compiler for the well known business programming language. FORTRAN (FORmula TRANslator), a compiler, runtime package, and "load and go" OS for the scientific language compiler.
References
Further reading King, Jane & Shelly, William A.: "A Family History of Honeywell's Large-Scale Computer Systems," IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, Vol. 19, No. 4, October/December 1997, pp. 42–46.
External links Company Sales Manual for the Honeywell 1800 Honeywell 800 a superior scientific computer A Family History of Honeywell's Large-Scale Computer Systems Martin H. Weik, A Third Survey of Domestic Electronic Digital Computing Systems, Ballistic Research Laboratories, Report No. 1115, March 1961 (ed-thelen.org) Real Machines with 24-bit and 48-bit words www.yourdictionary.com Honeywell