Calculating Pi on the 4004

See also Steve Wozniak's "Calculating e to 116,000 Places On An Apple ]["

https://downloads.reactivemicro.com/Users/Grant_Stockley/App...

This is a wonderfully engaging and insightful article, giving readers a good feeling for what computing was like in the old days. Plus, there's a link to a similarly intriguing article about the ENIAC situation (see below, the PDF is available at sci hub)

Shelburne, Brian J. “The ENIAC’s 1949 Determination of π.” IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 34, no. 3 (July 2012): 44–54. https://doi.org/10.1109/MAHC.2011.61.

Fascinating indeed. As a comparison, it would be interesting to do the same for various other processors such as, 8008, 8048, 8080, 8085, 8051, Z80, V20, 8088/86, 8086/87 combo, etc.

First we'd test these procs with a move/best fit translation of the 4004 code to 8-bit then redo the process with their additional/native instructions at 8-bit, etc.

Wishful thinking I know, but I've always wanted to know how these early procs compared against each other in raw calculating power.

Is the 4004 the only 4-bit CPU chip ever made? It would be neat to see an introductory digital electronics course around eventually designing one on an FPGA. It's just simple enough to stay interesting, not getting tiring like implementing a i8080 might be.

Quite interesting. The minor issue is not using rom and ram of that era. Is the timing similar ?

Facinating article! I wonder how it would compare to, say, the PDP-8/E.

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