??
2006-11-17 01:10:17 · 8 answers · asked by Anonymous in Computers & Internet ➔ Other - Computers
the personal computer (PC) didn't come about until about 1970. Before that computers where to big and costly to have in the home. the first programmable did appear until 1941 in germany, and the U.S. didn't develope one until 1948.
2006-11-17 01:26:14 · answer #1 · answered by saxon_148 2 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Personal computers (i.e. PC) did not exist back then. However computers in the form of calculator machines existed long before the 50s
2006-11-17 09:21:46 · answer #2 · answered by str1der 3 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Nope.
I built my first PC in 1979, called a Heathkit H-89. Had two hardsectored 5.25 inch floppy drives. Drives cost $595 each.
A huge 250 pound 5 Mb hard drive would have cost $10,000, so few of us got a hard drive, until about 1986, with the intro of the IBM PC.
Most computers were also built as a VT-100 compatible terminal for mainframes, plus, with the addition of a 300 baud modem, could get on a Dial-up Bulletin Board and chat with other enthusiasts, asn swap programs!
I played games in CP/M, HeathDOS, and other great programming languages! But, the ugly head of PROPRIETARY and very costly ($500 for CP/M!) programs were locking folks into a life of sin and piracy... We were encouraged to purchase something, make three backup copies, so when they crashed or the imperfect technology ate the floppy system, we had a back-up.
Still needed today, so we back up all software in our systems! We lock the original in a filing cabinet!
The system was ALL-in-ONE. Games like Orion, and Defender were all done in ASCII characters. The clock speed was 4.77Mhz. The processor used was the Zilog Z-80 on the architecture of the 8080 platform, but, Zilog was to a large extent made up of disgruntled previous employees of Intel who wanted to improve the 8080 cpu, but, were stymied.
Zilog "owned" the market after about 6 months of production! Their Z-80 CPU was a direct plug in replacement for the 8080, but offered 28 MORE instructions!!!
I don't think Intel has changed much, though they have grown huge. The same old thinking of dinosaurs seems to reign.
AMD,Cyrix, Lucent, IBM have on several occasions, almost made Intel toast in the market place!
That's my experience, and I was there. Now, I run AMD or Intel, or whatever, as long as I have Linux, so they run upto 50X faster!
http://pclinuxos.com comes with 1900 FREE games and programs, runs live in the CDrom, so no hard drive is needed. When installed, it opens to 5500 MORE FREE games and programs and apps!
Go and search google.com for history of computing! See all the offerings we had in the 1980's!
2006-11-17 09:40:23 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
The history of computers go way back to 300bc ..
however, programmable computers, as we call them now as, was first introduced in 1941. To get more details go through this site ..
http://www.computersciencelab.com/ComputerHistory/History.htm
2006-11-17 09:23:40 · answer #4 · answered by gfts 1 · 2⤊ 0⤋
are you kidding? the TV barley existed in the 50's. some of us had a phone.
2006-11-17 09:18:37 · answer #5 · answered by jymsis 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
No.
You can find a history of personal computers at this link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_computer
2006-11-17 09:18:26 · answer #6 · answered by Tamborine 5 · 2⤊ 0⤋
http://www.islandnet.com/~kpolsson/comphist/
2006-11-17 09:20:25 · answer #7 · answered by Fremen 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
no
2006-11-17 09:18:26 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 0⤋