The 30-bit AN/USQ-20 Naval Tactical Data System (NTDS), was designed for real-time tactical analysis, display and control of weapons. The advent of high-speed planes and missiles in the 1950s intensified the threat to American warships. Defending them required processing and coordinating a tidal wave of information. The NTDS used computers to integrate and display radar, sonar and communications data for the purpose of air defense. The first batch of 17 computers were delivered to the Navy starting in early 1961. A version of this 1052 kg machine for use by the other military services and NASA was designated the UNIVAC 1206. Another version, designated the G-40, replaced the vacuum tube UNIVAC 1104 in the BOMARC Missile Program. Also known as the CP-642, this 10,702 transistor, single address machine consumed 25 kW of power and had 32,768 words of core memory with 3.6 µs access time allowing it to add two numbers in 9.6 µs. The instruction set repertoire was 62 distinct operations. Following Lincoln Labs’ study of SAGE’s impact, the Navy launched a project to create a fast and flexible computer system for a single ship. Seymour Cray did the initial primary logic and circuit design for the NTDS computer in 1957 and it was developed in 1958 by the Saint Paul division of Remington Rand Univac, Price tag: $500,000.
