<P> Although the Ballistic Research Laboratory was the sponsor of ENIAC, one year into this three - year project John von Neumann, a mathematician working on the hydrogen bomb at Los Alamos National Laboratory, became aware of this computer . Los Alamos subsequently became so involved with ENIAC that the first test problem run consisted of computations for the hydrogen bomb, not artillery tables . The input / output for this test was one million cards . </P> <P> Related to ENIAC's role in the hydrogen bomb was its role in the Monte Carlo method becoming popular . Scientists involved in the original nuclear bomb development used massive groups of people doing huge numbers of calculations ("computers" in the terminology of the time) to investigate the distance that neutrons would likely travel through various materials . John von Neumann and Stanislaw Ulam realized the speed of ENIAC would allow these calculations to be done much more quickly . The success of this project showed the value of Monte Carlo methods in science . </P> <P> The completed machine was announced to the public the evening of February 14, 1946 and formally dedicated the next day at the University of Pennsylvania . The original contract amount was $61,700; the final cost was almost $500,000 (approximately $6,300,000 today). It was formally accepted by the U.S. Army Ordnance Corps in July 1946 . ENIAC was shut down on November 9, 1946 for a refurbishment and a memory upgrade, and was transferred to Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland in 1947 . There, on July 29, 1947, it was turned on and was in continuous operation until 11: 45 p.m. on October 2, 1955 . </P> <P> A few months after ENIAC's unveiling in the summer of 1946, as part of "an extraordinary effort to jump - start research in the field", the Pentagon invited "the top people in electronics and mathematics from the United States and Great Britain" to a series of forty - eight lectures given in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; all together called The Theory and Techniques for Design of Digital Computers--more often named the Moore School Lectures . Half of these lectures were given by the inventors of ENIAC . </P>

Who designed first digital computer using binary system