How long would it take to rebuild a Pentium PC if everything man-made suddenly vanished from the planet?

Question

We are all left behind, with all our knowledge and memories intact, but everything we've ever made -- tractors, books, computers, telephone poles, paved roads -- vanishes entirely. So how long would it be before we have the technology infrastructure in place again to build advanced computer processors?

Answer 1

I would take 27.2 years, give or take 40 years. I would say that you would have to start by reinventing the wheel, then stone tool fabrication, then begin mining and forging of metals to make better tools and rudimentary electrical components such as wire and filament for tubes, which in turn can be used as tools to increase development of chemicals necessary to improve natural resources and the refinement of silicon products.

One more important thing that would have to happen pretty soon after every man made thing was destroyed ..... paper and pen must be made so that the living people with the knowledge to build processors/hardware and software can impart their knowledge, since they may not survive long enough for the time when we would have the technology to catch up to our knowledge, and since cryogenics don't work now, they most certainly wouldn't work then.

Answer 2

Maybe, next time around, Intel and Bill Gates won't be in charge?!

Of course, most basically, you need to extract and process fuels, refine metals, make glass and start to rebuild industry. A really good tool & die worker takes years and years to train and that is when he can order a lathe or CNC milling machine from a catalog. Now he's reduced to "stone knives and bear skins" to quote Mr Spock all while hunting/gathering for food.

More problematic are two issues:

1) We've already extracted all the easy to obtain fuels and minerals. Oil no longer seeps to the ground in Pennsylvania. Gold nuggets are no longer lying in a stream bed in California and you can't pick diamonds off the ground in South Africa. We know there's a lot of oil under the Alaskan North Slope, for instance. The geologists involved even know where and how deep and how much and that is of huge importance. But how are you going to drill to 12,000 in the arctic with driftwood and flint tools?

2) social collapse - look at what happened after Katrina in New Orleans last year. And that was mild, very very mild in comparison. People still had the clothes on their back,the climate was mild, most buildings remained standing, the police and national guard still had their guns, 50 miles away grocery stores and businesses were untouched, within a week the federal government responded but needed planes, highways, trucks and telephones to do so.

You can't support 6 billion people without mechanized farming, petrochemcial fertilizers, pesticides, and highly mechanized fisheries. You think you know how to grow a garden, but you drive to nursery to buy seeds, fertilizer, and a shovel. And that garden only ever provided a few side dishes. You never planted acres of potatos/wheat/rice. And protected them from the maurading hordes of starving people.

So as Earth went through an ugly transition from 6 billion people to a pre-industrial population of about 500 million (or plummeted to a pre-agricultural level of 20 million people), who's to say that the BP petroleum engineer, the ALCOA metalugist, and the Intel design engineer would be among those to survive?

Answer 3

there isnt sufficient organic nutrition sources to feed 6.7 billion people. so 2/3's of those people could die off in the 1st 3 months. with each and all the mass demise pleage and desise could run a rampage at something of society. purely some thousand could nevertheless be alive with in the 1st 2 years. then they could commence the rebuilding technique.

Answer 4

I'm not sure about the Pentium PC, but I could put together a fairly decent basic slide rule in a couple of hours. I'd have to dig up my old log tables to build one of the log-log types.

Wonderful things were designed when we only had slide rules and our minds. We could do it again.

Answer 5

I think it will take a pretty long time.

Don't think about a computer.

Just think simple things first, even building tables and chairs may be a problem. No saw, no nails, no hammer, no planks, etc.

We will be down to physical needs, food, shelter and safety from the elements and predators.

Answer 6

a very long time. the fabrication process for making the transistors inside a pentium is a very complicated task.

Answer 7

not more than 50 years

Answer 8

id say propably 2 generations before we are completey back up 2 date

Answer 9

my answer would be does it really matter if everything is gone