History of computing hardware

History of Computers

The history of automatic data processing begins with Charles Babbage’s attempt to build an automatic mechanical calculator at Cambridge, England, in 1830. In 1930’s punched cards were in wide use in large businesses. In 1937 Howard Aiken, at Harwad, proposed IBM that a machine could be constructed to automatically sequence the operations and calculations performed. This machine used combination of electromechanical devices, including relays (mercury delay lines)

First Generation Computers

Ø  UNIVAC (Universal Automatic Computer) marks the beginning of the first generation of electrical computers.

ß(UNIVAC)

Ø  1^st generation computers employed vacuum tubes.

Ø  The input & output were punched card reader and the card punches.

Ø  IBM-650 was the most popular 1^st generation computer and was introduced in 1950 with magnetic drum memory punched cards for input & output.

ß(IBM-650)

Ø  It was intended for both business & scientific applications.

Second Generation computers

Ø  These computers employed germanium transistors & other solid state devices.

Ø  Their circuits were smaller than the vacuum tubes, & generated less heat.

Ø  2^nd generation computers required less power, were faster and more reliable.

Ø  IBM 1401 was the most popular second generation computer.

ß(IBM 1401)

Ø  They employed magnetic tape as input/output media.

Third Generation computers

Ø  3rd generation of computers employed integrated circuits in which all the elements of an electronic circuit are contained in a tiny silicon wafer.

Ø  3^rd generation computers are much cheaper and more reliable than the 2^nd generation computers.

Ø  They are faster with more capacity & admit connection of wide range of peripherals particularly magnetic disk units.

Ø  3^rd generation computers can be used for both scientific and business applications.

Ø  3^rd generation computers permit multi-programming, time sharing which is the use of the computer by several customers at a time, operating systems.

Ø  3^rd generation computers permit use of High Level Languages (HLL) as FORTRAN 4 and COBOL 68.

Fourth generation computers

Ø  4^th generation computers appeared in 1970’s.

Ø  4^th generation computers employed large scale Integrated Circuit (LSI), it is a small “chip” which contains thousands of small electronic components which function as a complete system.

Ø  A single chip may perform the function of the entire computer, calculator or control device.

Ø  In 1981 International Business Machine (IBM) made its first appearance in the field of microcomputer with the announcement of the IBM Personal Computers. The term Personal Computer captured the notion that an individual can have her or his own computer. Instead of adopting 8-bit microprocessor, IBM selected Intel 8088- a 16-bit microprocessor which made the IBM PC “an overnight success”.

Ø  In 1983, IBM’s first addition to the PC-family-XT model was introduced, which added a high capacity hard disk storage facility to the PC.

Ø  In 1984, IBM introduced two new high powered models viz        1. Compaq Desk Pro the 1^st  member of the PC family to have  more basic computing power than the original PC

2. IBM PC.

Ø  The successor to the IBM PC, the IBM personal system/ 2, or IBM PS/ 2, (introduced in 1987) have almost become a milestone in PC history.

Ø  Introduced in 1982 the Commodore-64 was significant because it signaled the buying public that powerful micros could be manufactured and sold at reasonable cost $599.

Ø  In 1984, Apple Computer introduced the Macintosh with a very “friendly” graphical user interface.

Ø  The second decade of 4^th generation computers observed a great increase in the speed of the microprocessors and the main memory.

Ø  In 1995, the most popular CPUs were Pentium, Power PC. Also RISC(Reduced Instruction Set Computers) microprocessors are preferred in powerful servers for numeric computing and file services.

Ø  The hard disks are also available of the sizes up to 20 GB. For large disks RAID technology (Reduced Array of Inexpensive disks) gives storage up to hundreds of GB. The CD-ROMs(Compact Disk Read Only Memory) are also becoming popular day by day.

Fifth generation of computers

Ø  Defining the 5^th generation is somewhat difficult because the field is in its infancy.

Ø  The most of the 5^th generation computer is the fictional HAL9000 from Arthur. C. Clarke’s novel, 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Ø  HAL performed all of the functions currently envisioned for real-life 5^th generation computers. With artificial intelligence, HAL could reason well enough  to hold conversations with its human operators, use visual input, and learn from its ow experiences.