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Recommended: History of computers
A computer is a general purpose device that can be programmed to carry out a set of arithmetic or logical operations. Since a sequence of operations can be readily changed, the computer can solve more than one kind of problem. Conventionally, a computer consists of at least one processing element, typically a central processing unit and some form of memory. The processing element carries out arithmetic and logic operations, and a sequencing and control unit that can change the order of operations based on stored information. Peripheral devices allow information to be retrieved from an external source, and the result of operations saved and retrieved. In World War II, mechanical analog computers were used for specialized military applications. During this time the first electronic digital computers were developed. Originally they were the size of a large room, consuming as much power as several hundred modern personal computers . Modern computers based on integrated circuits are millions to billions of times more capable than the early machines, and occupy a fraction of the space. Simple computers are small enough to fit into mobile devices, and mobile computers can be powered by small batteries. Personal computers in their various forms are icons of the Information Age and are what most people think of as “computers.” However, the embedded computers found in many devices from MP3 players to fighter aircraft and from toys to industrial robots are the most numerous. History of computing Etymology The first recorded use of the word “computer” was in 1613 in a book called “The yong mans gleanings” by English writer Richard Braithwait I haue read the truest computer of Times, and the best Arithmetician that euer breathed, and he... ... middle of paper ... ...e working at Bell Labs in November 1937, Stibitz invented and built a relay-based calculator he dubbed the “Model K”, which was the first to use binary circuits to perform an arithmetic operation. Later models added greater sophistication including complex arithmetic and programmability. The Atanasoff–Berry Computer was the world's first electronic digital computer, albeit not programmable. Atanasoff is considered to be one of the fathers of the computer. Conceived in 1937 by Iowa State College physics professor John Atanasoff, and built with the assistance of graduate student Clifford Berry, the machine was not programmable, being designed only to solve systems of linear equations. The computer did employ parallel computation. A 1973 court ruling in a patent dispute found that the patent for the 1946 ENIAC computer derived from the Atanasoff–Berry Computer. The fir
Another invention that is now frequently used is the computer. The concept was made in 1822, by Charles Babbage, but it wasn’t until 1837 when he ...
“In 1946, John Mauchly and J Presper Eckert developed the fastest computer at that time, the ENIAC I. It was built under the assistance of the US army, and it was used on military researches. The ENIAC I contained 17468 vacuum tubes, along with 70000 resistors, 10000 capacitors, 1500 relays, 6000 manual switches and 5 million soldered joints. It covered 1800 square feet of floor space, weighed 3 tons, consumed 160 kilowatts of electrical power.”(Bellis, Inventors of Modern Computer)
“…With the advent of everyday use of elaborate calculations, speed has become paramount to such a high degree that there is no machine on the market today capable of satisfying the full demand of modern computational methods. The most advanced machines have greatly reduced the time required for arriving at solutions to problems which might have required months or days by older procedures. This advance, however, is not adequate for many problems encountered in modern scientific work and the present invention is intended to reduce to seconds such lengthy computations…” From the ENIAC patent (No. 3,120,606), filed 26 June 1947.
Mark I. It was actually a electromechanical calculation. It is said that this was the first potentially computers. In 1951 Remington Rand’s came out with the UNIVAC it began
Many encyclopaedias and other reference works state that the first large-scale automatic digital computer was the Harvard Mark 1, which was developed by Howard H. Aiken (and team) in America between 1939 and 1944. However, in the aftermath of World War II it was discovered that a program controlled computer called the Z3 had been completed in Germany in 1941, which means that the Z3 pre-dated the Harvard Mark I. Prof. Hurst Zuse (http://www.epemag.com/zuse/)
...ere are gears used to select which numbers you want. Though Charles Babbage will always be credited with making the first “true” computer, and Bill Gates with popularizing it, Blaise Pascal will always have a place among the first true innovator of the computer. There is even a programming language called Pascal or Object Pascal which is an early computer program.
Computer engineering started about 5,000 years ago in China when they invented the abacus. The abacus is a manual calculator in which you move beads back and forth on rods to add or subtract. Other inventors of simple computers include Blaise Pascal who came up with the arithmetic machine for his father’s work. Also Charles Babbage produced the Analytical Engine, which combined math calculations from one problem and applied it to solve other complex problems. The Analytical Engine is similar to today’s computers.
The early history of mechanical computers really began to take off in the mid 1940’s. Between 1943-1946 the first true general purpose electronic computer was made. Constructed at the University of Pennsylvania the computer was named the ENIAC (electronic numerical integrator and computer.) The ENIAC was developed by two important keystone species, John William Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert Jr. The ENIAC was absolutely humongous; it stood 10 feet tall and occupied 1,000 square feet of floor space. On top of that it weighed in at 30 tons! The major problem with the ENIAC was its reliability. The ENIAC ran on vacuum tubes, and these vacuum tubes constantly burnt out causing people to replace them on an average of 50 times a day. Both Mauchly and Eckert realized that the ENIAC needed major improvement and began working on other designs. Unfortunately due to several members abandoning the project to pursue other jobs their next computer, the EDVAC never really took off.
Computers are very complex and have many different uses. This makes for a very complex system of parts that work together to do what the user wants from the computer. The purpose of this paper is to explain a few main components of the computer. The components covered are going to be system units, Motherboards, Central Processing Units, and Memory. Many people are not familiar with these terms and their meaning. These components are commonly mistaken for one and other.
Computer is an advanced electronic device and consist powerful components to enter data and instructions. The next is electronic device will process these data with control a set of instructions which
George Stibitz constructed a 1-bit binary adder suing relays in 1937. This was one of the first binary computers. In the summer of 1941 Atanasoff and Berry completed a special purpose calculator for solving systems of simultaneous linear equations, later called "ABC" ( Atanasoff Berry Computer). In 1948 Mark I was completed at Manchester University. It was the first to use stored programs. In 1951 whirlwind was the first real-time computer was built for the US Air Defense System.
At the same time Z3 computer built out of ectromechanical relays. In 1944, the Colossus was built and then the Mark I was built and then ENIAC was built and so on. Some were binary, some used vacuum tubes, some were programmable, but all were very primitive.
The history of the computer dates back all the way to the prehistoric times. The first step towards the development of the computer, the abacus, was developed in Babylonia in 500 B.C. and functioned as a simple counting tool. It was not until thousands of years later that the first calculator was produced. In 1623, the first mechanical calculator was invented by Wilhelm Schikard, the “Calculating Clock,” as it was often referred to as, “performed it’s operations by wheels, which worked similar to a car’s odometer” (Evolution, 1). Still, there had not yet been anything invented that could even be characterized as a computer. Finally, in 1625 the slide rule was created becoming “the first analog computer of the modern ages” (Evolution, 1). One of the biggest breakthroughs came from by Blaise Pascal in 1642, who invented a mechanical calculator whose main function was adding and subtracting numbers. Years later, Gottfried Leibnez improved Pascal’s model by allowing it to also perform such operations as multiplying, dividing, taking the square root.
The UNIVAC (Universal Automatic Computer) was the first computer which was not a one-of-a- kind laboratory instrument. The UNIVAC became a household word in 1952 when it was used on a televised newscast to project the winner of the Eisenhower- Stevenson presidential race with stunning accuracy. That same year Maurice V. Wilkes (developer of EDSAC) laid the foundation for the concepts of microprogramming, which was to become the guide for computer design and construction. In 1954, the first general-purpose computer to be completely transistorized was built at Bell Laboratories.
The fist computer, known as the abacus, was made of wood and parallel wires on which beads were strung. Arithmetic operations were performed when the beads were moved along the wire according to “programming” rules that had to be memorized by the user (Soma, 14). The second earliest computer, invented by Blaise Pascal in 1694, was a “digital calculating machine.” Pascal designed this first known digital computer to help his father, who was a tax collector. Pascal’s computer could only add numbers, and they had to be entered by turning dials (Soma, 32). It required a manual process like its ancestor, the abacus. Automation was introduced in the early 1800’s by a mathematics professor named Charles Babbage. He created an automatic calculation machine that was steam powered and stored up to 1000 50-digit numbers. Unlike its two earliest ancestors, Babbage’s invention was able to perform various operations. It relied on cards with holes punched in them, which are called “punch cards.” These cards carried out the programming and storing operations for the machine. Unluckily, Babbage’s creation flopped due to the lack of mechanical precision and the lack of demand for the product (Soma, 46). The machine could not operate efficiently because technology was t adequate to make the machine operate efficiently Computer interest dwindled for many years, and it wasn’t until the mid-1800’s that people became interested in them once again.