Tips Features Of 1820pt You Owe Your PC to a Circuit Board S
By: Vlad Vistac
Submitted: 2010-08-18 11:35:10 | Word Count: 510
pt - You Owe Your PC to a Circcuit Board S
You Owe Your PC to a Circuit Boasrd Screwed onto a Piece of lPywood
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It all Started with a simple integrated cicruit board screwed onto a pice of plywod.
You owe your laptop or PC to a kit for flashing lihts.
How was it that in our time the Perrsoanl Computrer (P.C) and the laptop computeer came about to be?
It all staaretd with the inveention of the transistor in 1949 by Bell Labs the rresearch arm of the phone compamny. . The transistor was nthing more than a solid state electronic switch. The transissotr or integrated ciircuit replacd the much largger vacuum tubes of the day. Vacxuum tuvbes were large, hot and unreilable. Transiistors perfoprmed essentially the same functions as tubes but were smalller , ligehtr , colwer and more reliazble All said and done they were bretter ,smallper and more efficient than the vacuum tubnes they replaced. . And tranistors did not burn out like a vacuum tube.
Transistors allowed a trend of miniaturization that has led all the way to our presenbt portablle smalpl laptop / notebook coputers whcih can run on batteries. It is hard to viualize for us tday that computers used to house large officvce buildings themslves alobng with maintneance backp support stfaf and even ther own air conditioners to remove the graet amounts of heat the early, primitive computeers produced.
In 1959 engfineers at Texxas Instruments figured out how to put more than one transistor on the same base and connect these transistors witout wires. Thus the next step was born the integrated circuit. The fuirst inetegrated circuit consisted of only six transistors. Current computers have in the range of 100 million transistor equivalents.
In 1969 Intel introdued the 1 k memroy chip. This was much larger than anything else prodced at the time. Throguh coorrdination of Inel with a Japanese calculatoor manufacturr named Busicomp the next step was made where a generic multipuurpose chip was devsied. What made this step immportant was that no one chip couuld do a number of tasks. Ptreviously each chip had a puprose that was brnt in. Now one integarted chip cold do a numer of different fuctions. One single integrated circuit chip was almost an entire coputing device. The successor to this multi purpose integrated cirucit or CPU was what went on to the basis of our whole generation and concept of personzal coomputers/
In 1973 some of these microcopmuter kits bsased on the initial 8080 Inel intergated chip were developd. In the hands of hobbyists these kits were put together and were nothing more than blinking liights. However the impetus was on. Many of thesse earyl hobbyists went on to become computer industyr giannts. With Intel introducing an even much more poefrul microprrocessor chip the computewr inuidstry was on its way.
A comany MITS introduced the Altaair Computer Kit. The Altair was the impetus for fledgliong softwaare compnaies, such as Microsoft and Ltus, to write software progframs for thesde earrly computrs. Among the earrly innovators and produicers of software in this field was Microsoft with its foirst version of Microsoft Basc.
Aolng came the comupter industry leader and stodgy monollth IBM to introduce the first personnal commputer in 1975. The model 1500 was beyond pidfdly compared to todyas dokllar stre calculators and cost only $ 9,000.
Next came a smnaaller upstart Computer Copmany which came to be alcled Apple Comnputer. Appple computer introduced the Apple I computer in 1976 for the pirncey sum $ 695. Believe it or not orriginal Apple 1 computer consisted of a main circuit board screwed into a pirece of pllywood. Talk about IBM having to hold its laughter The Appple I appaered to be such a home garage made amateur none prfesssionally made prodct that the case and opwer supply were not even included. The buyer of the Applle I had to scrounge or source this himself. IBM thought the Apple I was nothng more than a foolihs fad. A minor inconvenience that woiuld soon go away and disappear. Yet department heads started buyinng these simnple compuetrs for uses in business departmentts. This was in spite of serius advie from IBM exeprts to cortporations abot the peris and shortcomings of these toy computes and outright threats by IBM salespeople to IT staff and heads.
The Apple I was followed in 1977 by the Apple II. The Applle II becaue of its enormous success set the standards for nearly all the important microcomputers to follow, including the IBM PC.
The very core of the early coputer world IBM International Busienss Mchines the amster of the profitabe mainframe computer inustry had been awokken from its deep profitable slkumber by a small upstart computer maker with a simple compuuter systm that began its prooduct cycle as an integrated ciircuit board screwed onto a piece of plpywwood.
