History of computers

  • First programmable computer

    First programmable computer
    The Z1 which was orignally named V1 began development in 1936 by Germany's Konrad Zuse in his parents' living room and is considered the first electromechanical binary programmable computer. The Z1 had 64-word memory and a clock speed of 1 Hz. Both programming and output were generated using punch tape with a specific reader.
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    The first digital computer

    The Atanasoff-Berry Computer(also known as the ABC) was considered the first electronic digital computer and was the first machine to use vacuum tubes. Professor John Vincent Atanasoff and graduate student Cliff Berry developed the ABC in 1937 and continued development until 1942 at the Iowa State College. On October 19, 1973, Judge Earl R. Larson concluded that the ENIAC, patent by Eckert and Mauchly was invalid and named Atanasoff the inventor of the first electronic digital computer.
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    The other first digital computer?

    The ENIAC(electronic numerical integrator and computer) was made by John Presper Eckert and John Mauchly. ts construction began in 1943 and was not completed until 1946. Although it was not completed until the end of World War II, the ENIAC was created to help with the war effort against German forces. the Judge may have ruled that the ABC computer was the first digital computer many still consider the ENIAC to be the first digital computer because the ABC wasn't fully functional.
  • The first stored program computer

    The first stored program computer
    The EDSAC(electronic delay storage automatic calculator)is an early British computer considered to be the second stored program electronic computer, after the SSEM. It was created at the University of Cambridge in England, performed its first calculation on May 6, 1949. It also has the distinction of being the first computer to run a graphical computer game.
  • The first computer company

    The first computer company was the Electronic Controls Company and was founded in 1949 by J. Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, the same individuals who helped create the ENIAC computer. The company was later renamed to EMCC or Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation and released a series of mainframe computers under the UNIVAC name.
  • The first PC/IBM compatible computer

    The first PC/IBM compatible computer
    Introduced on April 7, 1953, the 701 was IBM's first electric computer and the first mass-produced computer. Later IBM introduced its first personal computer called the "IBM PC" in 1981. The computer was code named and still sometimes referred to as the "Acorn" and had an 8088 processor, 16 KB of memory, which was expandable to 256 and utilized MS-DOS.
  • The first computer with RAM

    The first computer with RAM
    MIT introduces the Whirlwind machine March 8, 1955 , a revolutionary computer that was the first digital computer with magnetic core RAM and real-time graphics.
  • The first transistor computer

    The first transistor computer
    The TX-O (Transistorized Experimental computer) and first transistorized computer is demonstrated at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1956.
  • The first minicomputer/PDP

    The first minicomputer/PDP
    The PDP(programmed data processor)was a series of computers developed by Digital. The first PDP, and the first minicomputer was the PDP-1. It was developed in 1960 and had five-megacycle circuits, a magnetic core memory, and fully parallel processing with a computation rate of 100,000 additions per second.
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    The first personal computer

    The Altair or Altair 8800 computer from MITS was developed by Henry Edward Roberts and introduced on December 19, 1974 and was considered the first personal computer by Henry. Although the first personal computer is considered to be the Kenback-1, which was first introduced for $750 in 1971. Later, the Altair published on the front cover of Popular Electronics in 1975 making it almost instantly a huge success.
  • The first workstation

    The first workstation
    Although never sold the first workstation is considered to be the Xerox Alto, introduced in 1974. The computer was revolutionary for its time and included a fully functional computer, display, and mouse. The computer operated like many computers today utilizing windows, menus, and icons as an interface to its operating system.
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    The first laptop/portable computer

    The IBM 5100 is the first portable computer, which was released in September 1975. The first truly portable computer or laptop is considered to be the Osborne I, which was released in April 1981 and developed by Adam Osborne. The IBM PCD (PC Division) later released the IBM portable in 1984, its first portable computer. Later in 1986, IBM PCD announced its first laptop computer, the PC Convertible. Finally, in 1994, IBM introduced the IBM ThinkPad 775CD the first notebook with a CD-ROM.
  • The first Apple computer

    The first Apple computer
    The Apple I (Apple 1) was the first Apple computer that originally sold for $666.66. The computer kit was developed by Steve Wozniak in 1976 and contained a 6502 8-bit processor and 4 kb of memory, which was expandable to 8 or 48 kb using expansion cards. Although the Apple I had a fully assembled circuit board, the kit still required a power supply, display, keyboard, and case to be operational
  • The first PC clone

    The first PC clone
    The first PC clone was developed by Compaq, the "Compaq Portable" was released in March 1983 and was 100% compatible with IBM computers and software that ran on IBM computers.
  • The first multimedia computer

    The first multimedia computer
    In 1992 Tandy Radio Shack becomes one of the first companies to release a computer based on the MPC standard with its introduction of the M2500 XL/2 and M4020 SX computers.