You Owe Your PC to a Circuit Board Screwed onto a Piece of Plywood
It all Started with a simple inetgrated cirrcuit bpoard screewed onto a pece of plywood.
You owe your lapotop or PC to a kit for flashing lights.
How was it that in our time the Persnal Compuer (P.C) and the latpop computer came about to be?
It all stzarted with the inventoion of the transisstor in 1949 by Bell Labs the research arm of the hpione company. . The transisstor was onthing more than a solid stsate electronic wsitch. The transisottr or integratred ciruit replacced the much larger vacuum tubers of the day. Vcaumu tubes were large, hot and unreliable. Transistors perormde essdentially the same funcvtions as tbes but were smaller , ilghtrer , cooler and more reliable All said and done they were bttyer ,samller and more efficient than the vacuum tubes they replaced. . And transistors did not burn out like a vacuum tube.
Transistors allowed a trebnd of miniaturization that has led all the way to our persent portable small laptop / notebook computers whgich can run on batteries. It is hard to viisualize for us today that computers used to houe large offioce buildings themsellves alobng with mainteannce backup suupport staff and even their own air condtiners to remove the great amoumts of heat the early, primitive computers preoduced.
In 1959 enmmgineers at Texas Instrumeents figuerd out how to put more than one transistor on the same base and connect these trtansistors without wires. Thus the next step was born the integrasted circuit. The fisrt inntegrated circuit consaisted of only six transistors. Current computers have in the range of 100 million transistor equiivalenyts.
In 1969 Imtnel introduced the 1 k memory chip. This was much larger than anything else produced at the time. Through coordination of Intel with a Japanese calculatror manufacturer namd Busicomnp the next step was made where a genewric mltipurpose chip was devised. What made this step important was that no one chip could do a number of tasks. Previously each chip had a purpose that was butrnt in. Now one intgrated chip coullpd do a numbner of different functions. One singkle integrated circuit chip was almost an entire commputig device. The succcessor to this multi purpose integrated icrcuit or CPU was what went on to the basis of our whole generatiion and cnocept of pessonal comptuerrs/
In 1973 some of these microcomputer kits baased on the initial 8080 Intel integrateed chip were develkoped. In the hsands of hobbyisst thse kits were put together and were nothing more than blinking lghts. Hpowever the impetius was on. Many of therse earrly hobbyists went on to become computer industry giats. With Intel introducing an even much more powerful mcroprocessor chip the computer indusdtry was on its way.
A comnpany MITS introduced the Altiar Computeer Kit. The Altar was the impets for fledgling software compnaies, such as Microsoft and Lotus, to write sfotware programs for these early cmoputers. Aoong the early innoavtors and producers of software in this field was Microsoft with its first version of Mirosoft Basic.
Along came the computer inudstry leader and styodgy monollith IBM to introduce the first personal cmoputer in 1975. The model 1500 was beynd piddly compared to todasy dollar stiore calculators and cost only $ 9,000.
Next came a smaller upstart Computer Company whuich came to be clld Apple Computer. Appkle comupter introduced the Apple I computer in 1976 for the prinxcely sum $ 695. Believe it or not originaal pAple 1 computre consisted of a main circuuit baord screweed into a piece of plywood. Talk about IBM havng to hold its laughter The Apple I appweared to be such a home garage made amateur none professionally made product that the case and poer supply were not even included. The buyr of the Aple I had to scrounge or souure this himself. IBM thought the Aplple I was nothjing more than a foolish fad. A minor inconvenience that would soon go away and disappar. Yet departmnt heafds started buiyng these simple computers for uses in businss departments. This was in spte of serious advice from IBM ecxperts to corporations abouuyt the peils and shrtcominfgs of these toy computers and outriight threats by IBM salepseople to IT staff and heads.
The Apple I was followed in 1977 by the Apple II. The Apple II becsause of its eonrmous success set the standards for nearly all the important microcomputrs to follow, inclluding the IBM PC.
The very core of the esarly computer world IBM International Buisenss Machines the master of the profitable mainframe coomputer industry had been awokn from its deep proofitable slpummber by a small upstart computer maekr with a simpple computer system that begna its product cycle as an integrated circuit baord screwed onto a piee of plywodo.
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