Top 14 Quotes & Sayings by Seymour Cray

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American businessman Seymour Cray.

Last updated on April 14, 2025.

Seymour Roger Cray was an American electrical engineer and supercomputer architect who designed a series of computers that were the fastest in the world for decades, and founded Cray Research which built many of these machines. Called "the father of supercomputing", Cray has been credited with creating the supercomputer industry. Joel S. Birnbaum, then chief technology officer of Hewlett-Packard, said of him: "It seems impossible to exaggerate the effect he had on the industry; many of the things that high performance computers now do routinely were at the farthest edge of credibility when Seymour envisioned them." Larry Smarr, then director of the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois said that Cray is "the Thomas Edison of the supercomputing industry."

American - Businessman | September 28, 1925 - October 5, 1996

Source: Wikipedia

Anyone can build a fast CPU. The trick is to build a fast system.

Seymour Cray

I just bought a Mac to help me design the next Cray.

Seymour Cray

If you were plowing a field, which would you rather use? Two strong oxen or 1024 chickens?

Seymour Cray

The trouble with programmers is that you can never tell what a programmer is doing until it's too late.

Seymour Cray

Parity is for farmers.

Seymour Cray

As long as we can make them smaller, we can make them faster.

Seymour Cray

I talk to myself through the computer. I ask myself questions, leave things to be looked at again, things that you would do with a notepad. It turns out today that it’s much better today to do with a personal computer rather than a notepad.

Seymour Cray

#3 pencils and quadrille pads.(when asked what CAD tools he used to design the Cray I supercomputer )

Seymour Cray

Farmers buy a lot of computers.

Seymour Cray

Interesting - I use a Mac to help me design the next Cray.(when he was told that Apple Inc. had recently bought a Cray supercomputer to help them design the next Mac )

Seymour Cray

#3 pencils and quadrille pads.

Seymour Cray

One of my guiding principles is don't do anything that other people are doing. Always do something a little different if you can. The concept is that if you do it a little differently there is a greater potential for reward than if you the same thing that other people are doing. I think that this kind of goal for one's work, having obviously the maximum risk, would have the maximum reward no matter what the field may be.

Seymour Cray

Thank heaven for startups; without them we'd never have any advances.

Seymour Cray

I'm supposed to be a scientific person but I use intuition more than logic in making basic decisions.

Seymour Cray