TIMELINE OF THE HISTORY OF COMPUTERS

1617 Mathematician John Napier uses wooden rods for calculating. This calculation method was called
Napier’s Bones.
1642 Inventor Blaise Pascal introduces to the world the digital adding machine referred to as the Pascaline
digital adding machine.
1822 Charles Babbage shines forth the Difference Engine and the Analytical Engine which is considered a
real general purpose computing machine.
1906 Inventor Lee De Forest patents the vacuum tube triode. It was used as an electronic switch in the first
electronic computer systems.
1937 John V. Atanasoff creates what is considered the official first electronic computer. It is known as the
Atanasoff Berry Computer, or simply ABC.
1943 During World War II, Alan Turing develops the Colossus, a top secret British code-breaking computer.
It was built to decode German secret messages.
1945 John von Neumann outlines the architecture of the modern stored program computer system.
1946 An electronic computing machine called ENIAC is built by John Mauchly and Presper Eckert.
1947 The semiconductor revolution is blasted off when William Shockley, John Bardeen, and Walter
Brattain invent and test what is called a point contact transistor.
1949 At Cambridge University, Maurice Wilkes assembles the first practical stored program computer
called the EDSAC.
1950 The ERA 1101 is built by the Engineering Research Associates of Minneapolis. It is one of the first
commercially produced computer systems.
1952 The UNIVAC used by the U.S. Census Bureau becomes the first commercial computer to attract
substantial public attention.
1953 IBM ships its first electronic computer system called the 701.
1954 Gordon Teal from Texas Instruments perfects a silicon-based junction transistor which brings a
tremendous reduction in costs to build a computer. IBM’s 650 magnetic drum calculator is also established
as the first mass-produced computer. In the ’50s, 450 computers were mass-produced, if you can believe
that.
1955 The first fully-transistorized computer TRADIC is announced by Bell Laboratories.
1956 The TX-0 is built by MIT researchers. It is the first general purpose, programmable computer that is
built using transistors. Also, the era of magnetic disk storage is about to blossom when IBM ships a 305
RAMAC to Zellerbach Paper in San Francisco, California.
1958 The first integrated circuit is created by Jack Kilby at Texas Instruments. This proved that both
resistors and capacitors could exist on the same semiconductor material.
1959 IBM’s 7000 series mainframes become its first transistorized computer. Also, in 1959 Robert Noyce’s
integrated circuit allows printing of electrical conducting channels directly on a silicon surface.
1960 The first commercial modem called Dataphone is designed by Bell Labs. It was designed specifically
for converting digital computer data to analog signals for transmission across a long-distance network.
1961 According to Datamation magazine, IBM has approximately an 81.2 percent share of the computer
market. IBM also introduced the 1400 Series computer system in this year.
1964 IBM announces a family of six mutually compatible computers and 40 peripherals that work together
called the System/360. Seymour Cray’s CDC supercomputer performs up to three million instructions per
second which literally is a processing speed three times its closest competitor, IBM’s Stretch system. Also
in 1964, IBM’s SABRE reservation system is also setup up for American Airlines.
1965 Digital Equipment Corporation introduces the first commercially successful minicomputer called the
PDP-8.
1966 Hewlett-Packard enters the all- purpose computer business with its release of the HP-2115. The HP-
2115’s computing power is that which is formerly found only in far larger computer systems before it.
1968 Intel was founded on July 18, 1968, by Robert Noyce, Gordon Moore, and Andrew Grove.
1970 The computer-to-computer communication revolution expands when the U.S. Department of
Defense establishes four devices on the ARPAnet. Two of these nodes reside at University of California
campuses including one in Santa Barbara and another in Los Angeles. Another sits at University of Utah and
the fourth resides at SRI International.
1971 The 8-inch floppy disk is invented by a team at IBM’s San Jose Laboratories. One of the first personal
computers called the Kenbak-1 is advertised for $750 in Scientific American magazine. Also in 1971, the
first advertisement for a microprocessor appears for the Intel 4004 in Electronic News.
1972 Intel’s 8008 microprocessor makes its debut. Hewlett-Packard announces the HP-35. Steve Wozniak
builds his blue box which is a tone generator to make free phone calls.
1973 At the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, Robert Metcalfe devices the Ethernet method of networking.
Using the Intel 8008 processor, Micral becomes the earliest commercial non-kit personal computer system
based on a microprocessor. Also 1973, the TV Typewriter was designed by Don Lancaster. It provided the
first display of alphanumeric information on an ordinary television.
1974 Researchers at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center design the Alto which is the first workstation with
a built-in mouse for input. Also in 1974, Scelbi advertises the 8H computer. What makes the 8H special is
the fact that it is the first commercially advertised U.S. computer based on a microprocessor. It used the
Intel 8008 computer processor.
1975 Microsoft is founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen on April 4, 1975. The first commercial packet
switching network called Telenet is created. It is the civilian equivalent of ARPAnet. The January edition of
Popular Electronics features on its cover the Altair 8800 computer, which uses the Intel 8080
microprocessor.
1975 also was the year of the visual display module prototype. Designed by Lee Felsenstein, it was the first
implementation of a memory-mapped alphanumeric video display for personal computer systems.
1976 Apple is established on April 1, 1976 by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne to sell a single
board computer called the Apple I. The 5 ¼-inch flexible disk drive and disk is introduced by Shugart
Associates. The Cray I make its name as the first commercially-successful vector processor also in 1976.
1977 Apple Computer introduces the Apple II computer system. The TRS-80 is also introduced by Tandy
Radio Shack. Commodore also introduces the PET, or Personal Electronic Transactor.
1978 The VAX 11/780 from Digital Equipment Corporation features the capability to address up to 4.3GB of
virtual memory. This provided hundreds of times the capacity of most minicomputers of the time.
1979 Motorola introduces the 68000 microprocessors.
1980 The first hard drive for microcomputers, called the ST-506, is created by Seagate Technology. Also, in
1980 the first optical data storage disk contains 60 times the capacity of a 5 ¼-inch floppy disk. Another
sweet kick-off for the ’80s is the invention of the computer ―worm‖ by John Shoch from the Xerox Palo
Alto Research Center. This so-called worm is a short program that searches a network for idle processors.
1981 IBM introduces its Personal Computer (PC), kicking off the fast growth of the personal computer
market and revolution. Xerox also introduces the Star which is the first personal computer with a graphical
user interface (GUI). The first portable computer is also completed by Adam Osborne. Like many inventions
of the day, it gets its name from the inventor; hence, it’s called the Osborne I which weighed in at 24
pounds and sold for $1795 dollars at the time. Also, in 1981 Sony Corporation introduces and ships the first
3 ½-inch floppy disk drive and disks.
1983 Apple introduces its Lisa computer incorporating a GUI very similar to that first introduced on the
Xerox Star. Compaq Computer Corporation introduces its first PC clone that uses the same software as the
IBM PC.
1984 Apple Computer launches the Macintosh, which is the first successful mouse driven computer with a
GUI. It was launched, in fact, with a single $1.5 million commercial during the 1984 Super Bowl. Also, in
1984 IBM releases the PC-AT, which is three times faster than original PC’s. Its speed came from its usage
of the Intel 286 processor. The PC-AT also introduced a new computer bus called the 16-bit ISA bus.
1985 Philips introduces the CD-ROM.
1986 Compaq announces the Deskpro 386, which is the first computer on the market to use Intel’s new
386 chip. 1987 IBM introduces its PS/2 computers making the 3 ½-inch floppy disk drive and VGA video
standard for PC’s. Also introduced with the PS/2 was its inclusion of the first plug-and-play computer bus
for PC’s called MicroChannel Architecture (MCA).
1988 After leaving Apple, Apple cofounder Steve Jobs unveils his own company called NeXT. Also in 1988
Compaq and other PC makers develop a new computer bus called the Enhanced Industry Standard
Architecture (EISA). What was especially unique about this bus was that unlike MicroChannel, EISA
remained backward compatible with the ISA bus. Intel releases the 486 microprocessor which contains
more than one million transistors. Intel also introduces alongside it the 486 motherboard chipsets.
1990 The World Wide Web (WWW) is born after researcher Tim Berners-Lee develops HTML, the
Hypertext Markup Language.
1993 Intel releases the Pentium processor, leaving behind its old numbered naming convention in the
process as they realized it’s impossible to trademark a number. Intel also releases motherboard chipsets
and for the first time completes motherboards.
1994 Yahoo is founded by two Stanford graduate students named Jerry Yang and David Filo. (Fun Fact:
Yahoo originally started out with the name, Jerry’s Guide to the World Wide Web.)
199 Microsoft releases the first mainstream 32-bit operating system Windows 95 in huge numbers. Intel
releases the first processor in their P6 family called the Pentium Pro processor.
1997 Intel releases the Pentium II processor and AMD introduces the K6, which is compatible with the Intel
Pentium.
1998 Google is co-founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they are students at Stanford University.
The company is first incorporated as a privately held company in September of 1998.Microsoft releases
Windows 98. Intel releases their Celeron processor, which is basically a low-cost version of the Pentium II
processor of the time.
1999 Intel releases their Pentium III processor and AMD introduces their Athlon line of processors.
2000 Microsoft releases Windows Millennium Edition or Me, and Windows 2000. The 1GHz milestone is hit
when both Intel and AMD introduce processors running at 1GHz.
2001 Mac OS X, later renamed OS X then simply macOS, is released by Apple as the successor to its
standard Mac Operating System. OS X goes through 16 different versions, each with "10" as its title, and
the first nine iterations are nicknamed after big cats, with the first being codenamed "Cheetah," TechRadar
reported.
2003 AMD's Athlon 64, the first 64-bit processor for personal computers, is released to customers.
2004 The Mozilla Corporation launches Mozilla Firefox 1.0. The Web browser is one of the first major
challenges to Internet Explorer, owned by Microsoft. During its first five years, Firefox exceeded a billion
downloads by users, according to the Web Design Museum.
2005 Google buys Android, a Linux-based mobile phone operating system
2006 The MacBook Pro from Apple hits the shelves. The Pro is the company's first Intel-based, dual-core
mobile computer.
2009 Microsoft launches Windows 7 on July 22. The new operating system features the ability to pin
applications to the taskbar, scatter windows away by shaking another window, easy-to-access jump lists,
easier previews of tiles and more, TechRadar reported.
2010 The iPad, Apple's flagship handheld tablet, is unveiled.
2011 Google releases the Chromebook, which runs on Google Chrome OS.
2015 Apple releases the Apple Watch. Microsoft releases Windows 10.
2016 The first reprogrammable quantum computer was created. "Until now, there hasn't been any
quantum-computing platform that had the capability to program new algorithms into their system. They're
usually each tailored to attack a particular algorithm," said study lead author Shantanu Debnath, a
quantum physicist and optical engineer at the University of Maryland, College Park.
2017 The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is developing a new "Molecular
Informatics" program that uses molecules as computers. "Chemistry offers a rich set of properties that we
may be able to harness for rapid, scalable information storage and processing," Anne Fischer, program
manager in DARPA's Defense Sciences Office, said in a statement. "Millions of molecules exist, and each
molecule has a unique three-dimensional atomic structure as well as variables such as shape, size, or even
color. This richness provides a vast design space for exploring novel and multi-value ways to encode and
process data beyond the 0s and 1s of current logic-based, digital architectures."
TYPES OF COMPUTERS
Analog Computers: These are almost extinct today. These are different from a digital computer because an
analog computer can perform several mathematical operations simultaneously. It uses continuous
variables for mathematical operations and utilizes mechanical or electrical energy.
Hybrid Computers: These computers are a combination of both digital and analog computers. In this type
of computers, the digital segments perform process control by conversion of analog signals to digital ones.
Mainframe Computers: Large organizations use mainframes for highly critical applications such as bulk
data processing and ERP. Most of the mainframe computers have the capacities to host multiple operating
systems and operate as a number of virtual machines and can thus substitute for several small servers.
Microcomputers: A computer with a microprocessor and its central processing unit is known as a
microcomputer. They do not occupy space as much as mainframes. When supplemented with a keyboard
and a mouse, microcomputers can be called as personal computers. A monitor, a keyboard and other
similar input output devices, computer memory in the form of RAM and a power supply unit come
packaged in a microcomputer. These computers can fit on desks or tables and serve as the best choices for
single-user tasks. Personal computers come in a variety of forms such as desktops, laptops and personal
digital assistants. Let us look at each of these types of computers.
Desktops: A desktop is intended to be used on a single location. The spare parts of a desktop computer are
readily available at relative lower costs. Power consumption is not as critical as that in laptops. Desktops
are widely popular for daily use in workplaces and households.
Laptops: Similar in operation to desktops, laptop computers are miniaturized and optimized for mobile
use. Laptops run on a single battery or an external adapter that charges the computer batteries. They are
enabled with an inbuilt keyboard, touch pad acting as a mouse and a liquid crystal display. Its portability
and capacity to operate on battery power have served as a boon for mobile users.
Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs): It is a handheld computer and popularly known as a palmtop. It has a
touch screen and a memory card for storage of data. PDAs can also be effectively used as portable audio
players, web browsers and smart phones. Most of them can access the Internet by means of Bluetooth or
Wi-Fi communication.
Minicomputers: In terms of size and processing capacity, minicomputers lie in between mainframes and
microcomputers. Minicomputers are also called mid-range systems or workstations. The term began to be
popularly used in the 1960s to refer to relatively smaller third generation computers. They took up the
space that would be needed for a refrigerator or two and used transistor and core memory technologies.
The 12-bit PDP-8 minicomputer of the Digital Equipment Corporation was the first successful
minicomputer.
Supercomputers: The highly calculation-intensive tasks can be effectively performed by means of
supercomputers. Quantum physics, mechanics, weather forecasting, molecular theory are best studied by
means of supercomputers. Their ability of parallel processing and their well-designed memory hierarchy
give the supercomputers large transaction processing powers.
Wearable Computers: A record-setting step in the evolution of computers was the creation of wearable
computers. These computers can be worn on the body and are often used in the study of behavior
modeling and human health. Military and health professionals have incorporated wearable computers into
their daily routine, as a part of such studies. When the users’ hands and sensory organs are engaged in
other activities, wearable computers are of great help in tracking human actions. Wearable computers are
consistently in operation as they do not have to be turned on and off and are constantly interacting with the
user.