A Google software engineer has identified and explained every piece of computer hardware visible in the 1993 film Jurassic Park, compiling a detailed analysis that has resurfaced on Reddit and Hacker News. The investigation, by Fabien Sanglard, reveals that the film's production used over $1.7 million worth of real, period-accurate computing equipment, including Thinking Machines CM-5 supercomputers, Silicon Graphics workstations, and Apple Macintosh Quadra 700 systems.
The hardware behind the dinosaurs
Sanglard's research, published on his blog, identifies five Thinking Machines CM-5 systems, a Motorola Envoy PDA, and several SGI workstations such as the IRIS Crimson and R4000 Indigo. The film's special effects coordinator, Cory Faucher, explained in the book *The Making of Jurassic Park* that everything on set was functional, as audiences had become too sophisticated to accept fake computers. Silicon Graphics loaned $875,000 worth of hardware, Apple contributed $350,000, and an additional $500,000 went into other equipment and software.
The Unix system meme and its origins
The infamous line "This is a Unix system, I know this!" refers to the real experimental 3D file system browser FSN, which ran on SGI workstations. Despite decades of mockery, the film's attention to detail was meticulous. Characters are shown using actual command-line interfaces and the QuickTime video player. For enthusiasts, a 174GB "Virtual OS Museum" released earlier this year by computer historian Andrew Warkentin includes the FSN software seen in the film, allowing anyone to try it today.
Villains using Macs
Two of the computers used by the villain Dennis Nedry were Macintosh Quadra 700 models. This is ironic given Apple's reported policy against placing its products in the hands of antagonists. The film's production team sourced the machines to match the early-1990s setting, with Crichton's own computing background influencing the book's technical accuracy.