Computer History 1988 - 2010

Due to the increase in computing capacity during the last decades, tremendous improvements could be made to climate simulations. The CDC Cyber-205, which was used during the time of DKRZ's foundation in 1988, only allowed the simulation of either the atmosphere or ocean. The grid was coarse and the simulation periods had to be short. But even today, with one of the most powerful computers internationally used for climate research, the quality and fidelity of the simulations is limited by the computing ressources available.