ANOTHER HISTORY OF PERSONAL COMPUTING

A Condensed History of Personal Computing

1876	Hardware Alexander Graham Bell receives his first patent for the telephone.
1945	Hardware ENIAC, designed mostly by Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, became operational. With about 18,000 electron tubes, it was intended to calculate the ballistic paths of artillery shells. John von Neumann presented a basic design for a digital stored-program computer.
1947	Hardware Bardeen and Brattain demonstrated their point-contact transistor.
1950	Hardware William Papian at MIT built the first magnetic-core memory. He later worked at Washington University's Biomedical Computer Laboratory in St. Louis.
1951	Hardware The first UNIVAC was delivered to the U. S. Census Bureau.
1958	Hardware The integrated circuit is invented separately by Jack Kilby at Texas Instruments and Robert Noyce at Fairchild.
1963	Hardware Douglas Engelbart develops the computer mouse. Software J. C. R. Licklider, a native of St. Louis and a graduate of Washington University, is the first person to actually state, on paper, the need to have computers speak to each other using some common language.
1968	Hardware Gordon Moore and Robert Noyce leave Fairchild Semiconductor to form Intel. Software Douglas Engelbart demonstrates hypertext, object addressing, dynamic file linking and shared-screen collaboration.
1969	Hardware RCA introduces CMOS. Fairchild introduces CCD. ARPAnet launched. Software Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Labs write the first version of Unix on a PDP-11. Compuserve is founded.
1970	Hardware Mostek pioneers ion implantation techniques. Software
1971	Hardware Intel introduces the 4004 4-bit microprocessor chip. Software Ray Tomlinson at BBN invents email
1972	Hardware Hewlett-Packard HP-35 triggers an almost instantaneous replacement of the slide rule by the Reverse Polish Notation calculator. Xerox begins development of the PARC workstation. Software Paul Allen and Billl Gates form their first company, "Traf-o-Data".
1973	Hardware Xerox PARC develops the Xerox Alto, the first computer that uses a graphical display, mouse, menus and icons. Bob Metcalfe, Butler Lampson, David Boggs and Chuck Thacker develop Ethernet. Software NBS requests proposals for what later became DES (adopted in 1976).
1974	Hardware Software Gary Kildall develops CP/M (Control Program for Microcomputers), which becomes industry-standard operating system until IBM commissions MS-DOS for PC's debut in 1981. Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn publish their paper on TCP.
1975	Hardware The MITS Altair 8800, a hobbiest's kit, costs $397. It uses the Intel 8080 CPU and has 256 bytes of RAM. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak start Apple Computer in the Jobs family garage. The Zilog Z-80 CPU 2.5 MHz CPU has 8500 transistors. Software Xerox PARC has been showing a graphical user interface for four years. Paul Allen and Bill Gates write a version of BASIC for the Altair and start a company then named "Micro-Soft".
1976	Hardware Jobs and Wozniak incorporate Apple, sell the "Apple I". MOS Technologies introduces the 6502 CPU. Selling for around $25, it is later used by Steve Wozniak for his Apple II design. It will also be used in the Commodore PET, Commodore 64, and early Atari machines. Software
1977	Hardware The Commodore PET, Radio Shack TRS-80, and Apple II are all introduced. The Apple features 4 kB of RAM and costs $1298. Ken Olsen, CEO of DEC said, "There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home." Software IBM researchers build the first relational database. Rivest, Shamir and Adelman publish RSA algorithm and are credited with first implementation of Diffie's 1975 proposal for public-key cryptography.
1978	Hardware Steve Wozniak designs an inexpensive floppy disk drive for the Apple II. Intel introduces the 8086 16-bit CPU chip with 29,000 transistors. Digital begins selling the VAX 11/780 and VMS. Hayes Corp. ships first 300-baud modem. Fujitsu introduces 64k-bit RAM. Software Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston write VisiCalc, the first electronic spreadsheet. The "hot" word processor is WordStar.
1979	Hardware The Intel 8088 is based on the earlier 8086. Software Donald Knuth's TeX pioneers mathematical formalization of digital typesetting.
1980	Hardware The Motorola 68000 CPU with 32-bit instructions is popular in UNIX systems. It will later be used in Apple's Lisa and Macintosh. Software Xerox PARC refines early prototype language to produce Smalltalk-80, a pioneering object-oriented language. Tim Berners-Lee writes a small hyperlinking program that eventually evolves into the World Wide Web.
1981	Hardware The Osborne 1 is the first "portable" computer. On 12 August, IBM introduces the IBM Personal Computer. It has a 4.77 MHz Intel 8088 CPU, 64K of RAM, a 160KB floppy drive and sells for $2880 (monitor not included). 672,000 PCs are sold in the US. Software PC-DOS 1.0 ships with the IBM-PC, and MS-DOS follows shortly. It was originally developed as QDOS (Quick and Dirty Operating System) by Tim Patterson at Seattle Computer Products. Ashton-Tate markets dBase II (there never was a dBase I).
1982	Hardware A 5 MB hard disk costs $2995, and 256 KB of RAM can be added for $1100. 300 MB hard disks are about $15,000. IBM-compatible "clones" such as the Compaq portable are introduced. The ill-fated Apple Lisa is announced for nearly $10,000. Intel announces the 80286 with up to six times the computing power of the 8086. 800,000 PCs are sold in the US. Software Mitch Kapor starts Lotus Development and designs Lotus 1-2-3, which makes the IBM-PC the choice of business users. Microsoft Multiplan is their answer to VisiCalc.
1983	Hardware "The Perfect PC" is an 8 MHz 8088 with 256K of RAM, a 360KB floppy disk, a 10 MB hard disk, and a 12" monochrome monitor. It costs $4995. Osborne Computer goes out of business. Compaq Computer ships a 28 pound "portable" PC. The Apple "Lisa" with a graphical user interface is released. Unfortunately, it proves to be unreliable and costs $10,000. 1.3M PCs are sold in the US. Software Borland Software incorporates with Phillipe Kahn at the helm. Microsoft announces Windows 1.0 - but it doesn't ship for two more years. Satellite Software introduces WordPerfect. Microsoft Word is their answer to WordStar. MS-DOS 2.0 includes support for hard disks. Novell Netware appears.
1984	Hardware IBM introduces the short-lived PCjr for $1300, and the 6 MHz 80286 IBM PC/AT. With 256KB of RAM and no hard drive it costs about $4000 (monitor not included). IBM also introduces the PC/AT, with a 6 MHz. 80286, 512KB of RAM, 1.2 MB floppy drive, 20 MB hard drive, and 12.5" monitor - for $5800. EGA graphics supports 640x350 resolution and 16 colors. Hewlett-Packard begins selling the LaserJet printer. Apple advertises the Macintosh during the Super Bowl. Michael Dell builds mail-order PCs in his college dormitory room. 2.08M PCs are sold in the US. There are over 1000 host computers on the Internet. Software DOS 3.0! IBM's TopView is an early precursor to Windows. Apple introduces its graphical user interface, much like that used at Xerox PARC since 1971. GNU project is the start of organized open source code. Turbo Pascal redefines software development productivity. First issue of PC Week magazine.
1985	Hardware The Commodore Amiga is introduced. Intel delivers samples of the 16 MHz 80386 32-bit CPU with over 250,000 transistors. IBM introduces Token-Ring LAN. CD-ROM drives enter the market. Steve Jobs leaves Apple and starts NeXT Computer. 2.91M PCs are sold in the US. Software DESQview, a text-based DOS multi-tasker, is released by Quarterdeck. It may have been the best multi-tasking environment until Windows 3. Windows 1.0 ships on November 20. Windows cannot overlap (can only be tiled). Aldus Pagemaker makes desktop publishing useful and thus makes the Macintosh popular in businesses. AOL is founded.
1986	Hardware Compaq beats IBM to the marketplace with its DeskPro 386, $7900. More than half of the PC compatibles sold are "clones". "The Perfect PC" is a 10 MHz 80286 with 640KB of RAM, a 1.2 MB floppy disk, a 20 MB hard disk and a 14" CGA monitor. It costs $3995. SCSI interface enables fast PCs to be assembled from lower priced parts. Thinking Machines Corp. presents the CM-1 Connection Machine, a parallel system with 65,536 CPUs. 4.37M PCs are sold in the US. NSFNET is created and tightly linked to ARPANET. Software DOS 3.3. DESQView, GEM Desktop, and TopView challenge Microsoft with windows-like operating shells. MCI Mail and CompuServe offer interservice email, the first commercial cross-network service.
1987	Hardware The IBM PS/2 model 80 is its first 80386 model. It includes the 640x480 VGA standard and a new "MCA" data bus not compatible with previous I/O cards. Sun introduces its first SPARC RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computer) CPU. 6.46M PCs are sold in the US. Software IBM includes OS/2 with the PS/2 line. DR-DOS competes with MS-DOS, forcing Microsoft to add features and lower prices. Microsoft ships Windows 2.0 and Excel. A special version of Windows for 386 CPUs (Windows 386) appears on December 9. NetWare 2.11. Lotus removes copy protection from 1-2-3, marking the end of error-prone hardware-dependent anti-piracy schemes. There are over 10,000 hosts on the Internet.
1988	Hardware The Intel 386SX is 32 bits inside but only 16 bits to the I/O bus. It actually slows applications by only about 10%, but costs much less. Introduction of the EISA bus standard ends IBM control of hardware standards. Steve Jobs' NeXT Computer introduces it first product, the Nextcube, with an object-oriented operating system. "The Perfect PC" is a 20 MHz 80386 with 2 MB of RAM, 1.44 MB and 1.2 MB floppy disks, a 40 MB hard disk, and a 14" EGA monitor. It costs $3995. 7.42M PCs are sold in the US. Software WordPerfect 4.2, Lotus 1-2-3 2.01, dBase III Plus. Digital Research continues DR-DOS but loses momentum while patching it to work with Windows. OS/2 1.1 with Presentation Manager, the first OS/2 with a graphical user interface, ships. Samna Ami, the first Windows word processor, appears. It gives users a preview of the WYSIWYG world. Wolfram Research introduces Mathematica, allowing to PCs to help visualize mathematics. Robert Morris Jr. launches Internet Worm, disrupting over 6000 Internet host computers.
1989	Hardware Intel announces the 486 CPU with 1.2 million transistors and a built-in math coprocessor. 9.05M PCs are sold in the US. There are over 100,000 hosts on the Internet. Software Microsoft Word for Windows appears. Tim Berners-Lee circulates his proposal for a World Wide Web.
1990	Hardware 10.3M PCs are sold in the US. In March the DOD puts the Internet in the hands of its users, mostly universities and defense contractors. By October there are over 313,000 host computers connected. A Web server goes on line at CERN. Software Microsoft ships Windows 3.0 on 22 May. Tim Berners-Lee creates the HyperText Markup Language at the CERN lab in Switzerland. This forms the basis for the Internet's World Wide Web.
1991	Hardware 11M PCs are sold in the US. Software Microsoft and IBM separate their Windows and OS/2 strategies. Linus Torvalds creates LINUX, a freeware version of UNIX. User interest is extraordinary. Phil Zimmerman releases Pretty Good Privacy software over the Internet. CERN launches the World Wide Web.
1992	Hardware 13.5M PCs are sold in the US. In January there are over 727,000 hosts on the Internet. By the end of the year, there will be over 1,000,000. Software Microsoft upgrades to Windows 3.1 on 6 April, adding some measure of stability and some new features. IBM's OS/2 2.0 is a 32-bit operating system. Microsoft announces Win32, the 32-bit interface to Windows NT. The code name "Chicago" is heard. It eventually becomes Windows 95.
1993	Hardware The Intel 60 MHz Pentium with over 3 million transistors is introduced in March. It cost over $5 billion to develop. The PowerPC 601 offers Intel some competition. It will be used in the Power Macintosh. "The Perfect PC" is a 33 MHz 486DX with 16 MB of RAM, a 1.44 MB floppy drive, a CD-ROM and a 15" VGA monitor. It costs $3500. 16.6M PCs are sold in the US. Software Microsoft is selling DOS 6, Windows 3.1, and pushes Windows NT 3.1 as a file server operating system. They claim 25 million licensed Windows users. Marc Andreessen and Eric Bina at the NCSA develop Mosaic, a browser application for the Internet's World Wide Web. With the Windows for Workgroups 3.11 release, Win3 is finally stable enough for business users.
1994	Hardware Laptop computers get serious with CD-ROM drives. 19.3M PCs are sold in the US. Software Netscape Navigator is released for public beta testing. IBM OS/2 Warp 3.0. In March, LINUX 1.0 is released and thus energizes the open source code movement. The Moving Picture Experts Group developed the MPEG-2 standard for video compression. The Yahoo! search engine first appears.
1995	Hardware The Intel Pentium Pro with 5.5 million transistors can execute up to three instructions simultaneously. 23.8M PCs are sold in the US. Hitachi and NEC announce 1 gigabit dynmaic RAM chips. The DVD disk standard was introduced, promising a capacity of 4.7 GB. Software March: Microsoft "Bob" <G>. Windows 95 appears on August 24 with an unprecedented advertising budget. Known as "Chicago" during its development, it is the first version permitting full 32-bit applications and true multi-tasking. It runs really well in 32 MB of RAM. Microsoft claims selling one million copies in four days. Java, once a dialect of C++, becomes a portable language for the enhancement of Web pages. IBM conference call marks turning point in awareness of centruy-rollover issues, and "Y2K" housecleaning begins. Microsoft buys a Mosaic license from Spyglass to create Internet Explorer. AOL, Prodigy and Compuserve let users send and receive Internet email. Amazon.com.
1996	Hardware 27.1M PCs are sold in the US. There are over 10,000,000 Internet hosts. Software Microsoft promotes its Internet Explorer 3.0 Web browser and Windows NT 4.0. 64 MB of RAM is about right for NT. Windows CE is designed for small hand-held computers. The OSR2 version of Win95 incorporates many of the patches required to stabilize the original release. XML and Java.
1997	Hardware The Intel Pentium with 4.5 million transistors gains the MMX instruction set, designed to speed the operation of multimedia applications. The Pentium II is a Pentium Pro with MMX added, and plugs into "Slot 1" sockets. "The Perfect PC" is a 200 MHz Pentium MMX with 32 MB of RAM, a 1.44 MB floppy drive, a 2 GB hard drive, a CD-ROM, and a 17" SVGA monitor. It costs $3500. "Web TVs" cost under $350, and "palmtop" PCs using Windows CE are about $500. 300 MHz CPUs code-named "Klamath" are expected late in the year. Software Office 97 is not backwards-compatible with older versions. Once Internet Explorer 4.0 is installed, uninstalling it breaks Windows. Windows 97 won't ship until 1998. Windows NT5 begins beta testing. The "browser wars" heat up. Microsoft's "Internet Explorer" gains market share on Netscape's "Navigator", but the Justice Department is concerned about how they did it. IBM's "Big Blue" defeats world chess chamption Garry Kasparov.
1998	Hardware Intel's 350 and 400 MHz "Deschutes" CPUs use a 100 MHz bus in the "Slot 1" socket. 450 MHz is available by August. Some models will have 2 MB of L2 cache. Did these become the Pentium III? "Slot 2" CPU designs will scale to 8 processors and support up to 8 GB of main memory. The Pentium II for laptops will reach 300 MHz. The "Merced" chip is officially named "Itanium", due in July 2000. Compaq, having bought DEC, talks about its 64 bit Alpha 21364 chip, while Hewlett-Packard discusses its 64 bit PA-8500 and PA-8700. IBM will call its version the Power3. IBM and Motorola introduce techniques permitting the aluminum interconnects in IC chips to be replaced by copper. Higher speeds and less power dissipation will be the result. Software Windows 97, now called Windows 98, finally ships on 25 June. While Bill Gates was demonstrating Win98 to the press, it crashed. "Service Pack 1" is waiting in the wings. Windows NT5 won't be out by the end of the year, late 1999 is more likely. Microsoft supasses General Electric as the world's most valuable company. The Department of Justice sues Microsoft. AOL buys Netscape for $4.2 billion.
1999	Hardware The Intel "Katmai", a "Slot 1" 32-bit CPU with embedded three-dimensional instructions, was due. Did it become the Pentium III? The "Tanner", a "Slot 2" CPU with the Katmai New Instructions was also expected. The 500 MHz "Xeon" will be the version for servers and high-end workstations. Compaq's Alpha EV7 CPU should transfer data at 12.8 GB/sec. Cisco Systems now takes Microsoft's place as the world's most valuable company. Software Windows NT5, renamed Windows 2000, gets beta-tested. Napster opens a new era of file sharing. AOL buys Netscape.
2000	Hardware Intel's 64-bit "Itanium" (formerly "Merced") CPU and its new "Slot M" connector and speeds beyond 1000 MHz wasn't quite ready. Intel recalls buggy 1.13 GHz Pentiums. Front-side bus speeds reach 133 MHz. The Pentium 4 (née Willamette) achieves "400 MHz" bus speed, but it is really 100 MHz with four data transfers every clock cycle. The CPU core is said to run at 1.4 GHz. Software The dreaded "Y2K" problems fails to materialize. Office 2000, Windows 2000 (née NT5). It runs well in 256 MB of RAM. Bill Gates promises 64-bit Windows by the end of the year. AOL merges with Time Warner. The Internet passes 100,000,000 host computers.
2001	Hardware Servers using Intel's 64-bit IA-64 "Itanium" chip can be found. Intel's "McKinley" chip, a second-generation "Itanium" (was Merced), may appear by the end of the year with clock speed greater than 1 GHz. "Tualatin" is a new version of the Pentium III, expected to use 0.13 micron geometry. Look for both desktop and mobile versions to exceed 1 GHz. Look for 1.7 GHz AMD Athlons and 2.2 GHz Pentium 4's. The number of Internet hosts passes 100,000,000. Software Windows XP (actually NT 5.1) due in February - or October? On an average day, 1.6 million Napster users log on simultaneously. In February 2.8 billion files were downloaded.
2002	Hardware AMD "Clawhammer" and "Sledgehammer" chips, 64-bit, multi-processor, 0.13 micron geometry. Intel's Itanium will concentrate on improved internal data paths to boost performance. Its 266 MHz data bus is 64 bits wide, resulting in 2.1 GBps bandwidth. The one billionth PC is shipped in April. The second billion is expected to be reached in 2007 or 2008. Software Applications not recompiled for 64-bit CPUs will run slower than they do on 32-bit machines.

Much of the above information was provided by PC Magazine, InfoWorld and the IEEE.

Some other Web sites with information relating to the history of computing and the Internet include:

	Hobbes' Internet Timeline
	The Internet Archive
	A personal perspective

Microsoft Word has been around since 1989, and it's been a invaluable tool since then. But what happens when you need to convert PDF to Word? There is PDF conversion software available for you today. Moving your important PDF files to MS Word can be a very simple evolution.

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