The MARK II (whose full name is RCA Mark II Electronic Music Synthetizer), as the MARK I, is a synthesizer developed between 1932 and 1937 was created by VON NEUMANN and the mark I was the first electronic computer, under the direction from doctors Harry Olson and Herbert Belarel in the RCA laboratories.
To generate the synthesis I had 4 blocks of twelve oscillators that correspond to the 12 notes of an octave that can be modified by filters, resonators, white noise generators, etc.
As a data entry system, perforated paper bands were used where the programmer codes the parameters of the sound to be generated (height, sound intensity, etc.).
The MARK II, was a computer, but not as we understand it today, but as the great computers of then (the decade of the 50). It measured about 5 meters long by 2 meters high. It was valued at $ 500,000, for the time a tremendously high number (it still is today).
The Mark II (now also known as the Olson-Belar synthesizer in honor of its designers), was donated in 1959 to the Columbia Princeton Electronic Music Center in New York, where it is still operational (2016).
wiki
