Customer Rating: 
Summary: Fantastic!
Comment: A great read. I couldn't put it down. Technical enough to engage the scientifically savvy. Humorous and personal too. A must for those interested in how we became surrounded by computers in our daily lives.
Customer Rating:
Summary: This book was great
Comment: Even though the marketplace is getting bigger, many publications today are either "academic level" or "dummed down" for general consumption. This book is positioned between these two extremes and is just what I was looking for. One of many surprising things I learned was how the AGC (Apollo Guidance Computer) was the largest consumer if integrated circuits in the 1960s and was mainly responsible for kicking off this industry.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Excellent content, astronomical cost
Comment: This text is a very narrow treatise on an archaic topic; specifically, the history of the Apollo Navigation Computer. This computer was compact and versatile, being the first major effort to use integrated circuits extensively but before microprocessors.
The book is well written and interesting to me. There are many color photographs and diagrams that bring the author's description's to life. His narrative is enlightening for technically knowledgeable readers though the author also takes time to explain some basic concepts without slowing the work down.
The only problem with the book is that it costs 58 bucks. This is very expensive for a paperback book and that amounts to almost $3 dollars per page. This is probably due to being printed in small numbers by a specialty press. For this much money, though, I expect a hardcover.
Due to the specialization of its content and its high cost, I recommend this book only to those with great interest in either in early manned spaceflight or the history of computers.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Superior and Detailed Account
Comment: Eldon Hall has done something rare with this book. He has taken a very complex subject, nearly forgotten due to time, and made it utterly relevant and engaging. For anyone with an interest in either space or computer history, this is a vital book. It is somewhat technical (I had no idea how they made rope memory modules, an early ROM format before this book for instance), but Hall is very careful to explain things in terms that an average reader can readily understand.
The book itself documents the Apollo Guidance Computer from conception through numerous iterations and changes, to final successful lunar landings. Although the AGC capabilities seem trivial today, the AGC was the world's first Integrated Chip computer, and had enormous hurdles to overcome. In the end, of course, we know that Hall and his fellow employees at MIT did a good job...what I didn't know before was exactly what they had to do and the challenges they had to overcome.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Worth the Effort
Comment: A super volume - full of detail, a super account of the development of the guidance computer used by the Apollo flights. At the same time, this excellent book is a fascinating account of the growth of the computer itself; we forget how much technology Apollo kick-started, and this book illustrates very effectively the genesis of a new, extraordinary industry
