By Karen Edoff

Man
y inv
e nto p le x
to th rs co o m
e hi s ntrib a c
t
Each of whicho u
ry of can bet i
edconsidered
e r s y
co m m p u t i n e r t s
a separate invention. poute ma
c c h p a r
A e orsf a n y
e c o f m
pi e up
m a d
Lets explore those
inventions
Simple counting aid

Invented in the
4th century B.C.
The Modern Abacus
Used for :

multiplication
division
Still used in
addition
Asia and Africa
subtraction
square root
and cube root
 The first calculator
Invented in 1694
Very simple gears
Added up to 6 digits
Problem..
u r at e
t ac c
no d e
d iv i
t o r
u b t rac
l d n ’t s
co u
Arithmometer -1820
Finally a machine that could
Add
Subtract
Multiply and
Divide

RELIABLY
Still Problems…
All mechanical
calculators had moving
parts that were slow and
could break down.
First Programmable Computer
The Z3 By:KONRAD ZUSE

Uses binary math

And Boolean logic

In 1941 Fully functional

The Harvard Mark 1
was 1/2 the length of a football field

contained 500 miles of wiring

operated at 5 instructions/second
ENIAC
Created in
Electronic
Numerical
1945
Integrator
Analyzer and
Computer

Required enough energy

operated
to dim the lights at
of5000 instructions per second
Philadelphia when it was
weighed 30 tons
run.
I think there is a world market for
maybe five computers.
Computers
  -- Thomas Watson,inchairman
the futureofmay
IBM,
1943 weigh no more than 1.5 tons.
  -- Popular Mechanics, 1949
Vacuum Tubes
Early computers used
vacuum tubes.
Replacing a bad tube meant
checking ENIAC’s 19,000
possibilities
The First Transistors
Or electronic switches

Developed by:
Bell Telephone
They replaced a
Laboratories computer’s
vacuum tube in1956.
In 1945
 The IBM Stretch -1956
transistors replaced vacuum tubes

cost: $3.5 million

operated at 50,000
instructions per second
 The IBM Stretch
The first to:
Provide multiprogramming –
do more than one task at a time.
Memory interleaving, breaking up
memory into chunks for much
line up instructionshigher bandwidth.
in a queue, so that the
computer doesn’t have to wait between
operations Provide security which
prevents unauthorized
memory access
Establish the eight-bit byte
Programming Language-1957
COBOL, FORTRAN
Used to create programs that control
the behavior of a machine

Computers operating at 100,000

instructions /second
The First Integrated Circuits - 1958

Modern
Allows a computer to get smaller,
Integrated circuits
faster, cheaper
RAM -1970

The first
memory chip

contained more than 1,000 bits of information

Floppy Disks - 1971
The first 8" floppy diskette

Held 79.7 kb
of memory
 a b l e
v a l
i
l l y A –
rc i a t e rs
m e pu s
m
Co inico m 8 0’
M 1 9
’ s &
70
19
 Apple I - 1976
First single circuit board computer

8k of RAM
Only 200
Apple I ‘s
were built and sold
Apple II - 1977
First built in Operating System

Microprocessor
speed of 1 MHz

4 KB of RAM with

Option to upgrade to
48 kb of RAM
 Video Games -1970
Video games drove the demand for better and
more affordable computers.
 IMB - 1981
First computer to
come with a
keyboard, monitor &
printer.
 Commodore 64 -1982
16 colors 64 kilobytes of memory

two bitmap graphics modes

Directly plugged into a television

 Apple - 1984
Operating at 10-100 million
instructions per second

First 16/32-bit microprocessor

Processing speeds of 16.67 MHz

 o u ld
n e w .
n y o o m e
o n a i r h 7 7
e a s t h e ., 1 9
n o r r i n o r p
e i s p u t e n t C
h e r c o m pm e
T t a q u i
w a n a l E
ig it
O , D
, C E
l s o n
e n O
   --K
Personal computers are operating
at 1-2 GHz

1000 million to 2000 million

instructions per second
 cost: $4,000
fuel efficiency: 20,000 mpg
top speed: 60,000 mph

reliability: break every 70 years

seating: 10,000 people

More computers are sold than televisions
Operating at 2-4 GHz

2000 million to 4000 million instructions

per second
Comp
uter s
peed
every rough
18 mo ly double
nths s
USB 2.0 Approximately 1 billion
computers have been
Windows XP sold since 1970

Dot com boom Ipods

X-box

AOL has over 28 million members

 Late
2000’s
I-phone
MP3 Players

Mac Air

Netbooks
 128 MB RAM
Weight:23oz 

Touch screen 16 million colors  

320 GB
7 in
WiFi
Battery life: 39 hours (music)
Think of the possibilities…
 BIBLIOGRAPHY
http://www97.intel.com/en/TheJourneyInside/ExploreTheCurri
culum/EC_IntroductionToComputers/ICLesson1/
http://inventors.about.com/library/blcoindex.htm
http://www.pbs.org/nerds/timeline/elec.html
http://www.xnumber.com/xnumber/mechlist.htm
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/farid/teaching/cs4/summer.08/no
tes/historyofcomputing/
http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/25079.wss
http://www.computerhope.com/history/196080.htm