Computer History
Several successive inventions have been necessary before computer become possible...Inventions
Abacus. Invented by ancient chinese.
The clock. Bolter credits the invention of the weight-driven clock as the key invention of Europe in the Middle ages, in particular the verge escapement that provides us with the tick and tock of a mechanical clock. This led immediately to mechanical automata beginning in the thirteenth century.
Pascaline, first calculator by Blaise Pascal.
Jacquard loom (1801).
Ticker tape (late 1800).
The telegraph, (mid-1800) is the precursor of the telephone.
Difference Engine from Babbage (1821). First computer language designed with Ada Lovelace.
Hollerith cards (punch cards, 1887).
Teletype (1910).
Electromechanical relays (1935). With its two "binary states" open and closed.
Digital, binary adding device (1937) by George Stibitz based after relays.
Claude Shannon in a thesis at MIT shows how to implement Boolean algebra using electronic relays and switches (1937).
Baudot code encoding on tape.
EDVAC design. Implementing architecture of Von Neumann.
Magnetic core memory (1954).
Microprogramming (1955) now called firmware. By Maurice Wilkes. Base set of instructions extended by program.
Magnetic disc (1956). Introduced by IBM, called RAMAC.
Integrated circuit. Starts the third generation of computers in 1960s.
Computers
The Antikythera mechanism. Built in 87 BC, this computer was able to predict the astronomical positions. A functional replica was built today (video).
Analog computers. (Before 1940).
Model K, by Georges Stiblitz was a relay-based computer (1937).
Z series by Konrad Zuse. Z1 in 1936.
Atanasoff-Berry (1938) specialized computer for solving linear equations.
Harvard Mark I (1939). By IBM, decimal arithmetic as Babbage's engine.
Z3 (1941). Floating-point, binary. Turing-complete.
Colossus (1943). Used to break codes.
ENIAC (1945). Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer. A digital computer, by the university of Pennsylvania. Turing-complete.
EDSAC (1949). By University of Cambridge. First to implement the Von Neuman architecture. Program and data are in a same store.
EDVAC. Electronic Discrete Variable Automatic Computer, successor to ENIAC (not EDSAC).
Ferranti Mark I (1951). University of Manchester.
UNIVAC I (1951). Universal Automatic Computer. Par Remington Rand.
IBM 701 (1952). First mainframe.
IBM 704 (1954). Introduced magnetic core memory.
Micro-processor (1971).
The Intel 4004, 4 bits, appeared in 1971. The first 8 bits, Intel 8008 appears in 1972. The popular 8080 in 1974.
MOS 6502 microprocessor (1975). The cheap processor, $ 25 against $ 300 for the Motorola 6800 (1974) opens the way for microcomputers.
Micro-computers. How invented them? Some appeared with KIM 1, Altair 8800, Apple 1 (1976).
They become popular in 1977 with Apple II, TRS-80 and commodore Pet.
Storage
The storage unit IBM 3380 could contain 2.5 GB of data. Combining eight of them, you got 20 GB for a whole weighing 2 tons. It then cost $ 100 000.
Today we get 32 GB on an SD card with a weight of 1 gram and worth a hundred dollars!
See also:
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