Where do you go to get you're very own obsolete supercomputer to use as an objet d'art? To a warehouse in suburban Seattle.

Nathan Myhrvold, Microsoft Corporation's chief scientist, keeps a growing collection now numbering six supercomputers - three early Crays and three Connection Machines made by Thinking Machines Corporation. The Cray 1, designed in 1976 by Seymour Cray, the legendary inventor, was notable in part because it was a round refrigerator-shaped cabinet encircled by a padded bench, which was just the thing for technicians who needed to work on the machine's innards.

Today, the original Crays have less horsepower than some $1,000 personal computers, but as fashion statements, their time may be here again. Mr. Myhrvold is now planning a new home that will rival that of his boss, Bill Gates. It will have a living room big enough for a supercomputer. "The key aesthetic is that it is the most expensive sofa in the world," said Mr. Myhrvold, who bought his machines for their salvage costs or for a few thousand dollars."

Another Cray connoisseurs, Dan Lynch - one of the founders of Cybercash, has a Cray 1 in his vineyard in the Napa Valley along with 'a bunch of tired old '47 Chevys.' The stories continue...

An employee at Convex, a Texas-based supercomputer company, has bought a Convex C-1 for its scrap price and was using the computer to heat his garage. Fantastic.

((c) Ninfomania with help from Dead Media)