Computers were not always what we see today, as clearly illustrated in this photo of one of the very first early 1940s computer systems.
We hardly give computers a second thought in the 21st century. This little marvel is such an intricate part of our daily lives that we regard it as a necessity, instead of a luxury. We take computers for granted in our society. The consumer probably knows very little of the history behind this commonly used electronic gadget.
Who invented the first computer? A German named, Konrad Zuse, invented the first programmable binary computer (photo to left) in 1936 in his parents living room. Compared to computers today, the ENIAC pictured above was enormous, weighing 27 tons and taking up 680 square feet. That’s about half the size of a small house. The Atanasoff-Berry Computer known as the ABC was the first digital computer constructed in 1943-1946. The ABC was considerably smaller than the ENIAC, but still quite large. It was about the size of a desk.
Today’s computers can run a multitude of programs all at once, but this wasn’t always the case. In fact, the first computer to physically store a program was an early British computer called EDSAC in 1949 and it ran the first graphical computer game. One can only image how basic these graphics must have been? Do you remember what it was like to play the Atari video game Pong, which came out in the 70s? I do and trust me it wasn’t spectacular by our standards. It was actually very slow and a bit frustrating.
The golden happy days, the 1950s brought more integration in the computer revolutions with components and new software languages allowing a computer user to use English-like words instead of numbers and magnetic tape for data storage. An interesting discovery while reading the history, I learned CBS News used the UNIVAC to predict the 1952 election between Eisenhower and Stevenson. While the poll strongly favored Stevenson as a landslide winner, the UNIVAC analysis of early returns concluded the victory would belong to Eisenhower. It’s funny Walter Cronkite and Charles Collingwood was unsure of the experiment’s validity and decided it was best to put off revealing UNIVAC’s forecast winner until very late. An example of mankind beaten by his own ingenious know-how, right?
The second and third generation computers introduced the first interactive minicomputer and artificial intelligence during the 1960s. Software programs were becoming more complex and intelligent. The era also important to computers from a pre-Internet standpoint. Ted Nelson attempted to develop a hypertext-handling system known as Xanadu, which didn’t get completed, but what we know as the World Wide Web (WWW) today owes much of its evolution to Nelson’s concepts. Another important innovation from the 60s was early supercomputers.
In 1975, the Altair 8800 was introduced as the first personal computer (PC). This hardly resembles what we think of computers is, is it?
IBM introduced the first laptop computer in 1975, the IBM 5100. Surprised? Get this, the IBM 5100 weighed 55 pounds. Let’s see you carry this onto your next flight, let alone pull it through the airport terminal. lol
The Apple I was the first known Apple computer designed by Steve Wozniak in 1976. In the early 80s, Apple became known as Macintosh computers and then by the late 90s, Macintosh shortened to Mac. Today, Apple’s computers are some of the coolest gadgets on the market with the slickest, smallest gizmos on the market with their MacBook Air, iPad, and iTouch. Portability in computing has become super portable! You can view Apple’s progression over the years by visiting Apple History.
Today, there are many PC compatibles – Compaq (now owned by HP), Dell, Hewlett-Packard (HP), Sony, and Toshiba to name just a few. The computing power people have at their fingertips would blow those prehistoric gigantic machines out of this world…maybe the universe. All the while, it takes up only a microscopic part of your desk, unlike those earlier computers.
Do you remember the scene in Blast From the Past, where Brendan Fraser’s character got all bug-eyed when he heard his new friend had a computer in his bedroom and how he wanted to see it? I can only imagine what the designers of the EDSAC would think if they were living today to see how much technology has evolved. I would think this would leave them in deep wonderment, as they might thoughtfully proclaim, “That’s very interesting.”