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First form of data storage
The first known form of Data Storage was invented by Basile Bouchon. He invented a way to record data to control the weaving patterns of loom by using a big loop of paper with precisely punched holes. With further improvements by other inventors, these semi-automated looms sold quite good. -
Difference Engine
Charles Babbage came up with and developed the Difference Engine, considered to be the first automatic computing engine. -
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Analytical Engine
Charles Babbage proposed the first general mechanical computer.
It contained basic flow control, punch cards, and integrated memory and was the first general computer concept. -
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First Programmable Computer
The Z1 was created by Konrad Zuse between 1936 and 1938. It is considered to be the first electro-mechanical binary programmable computer. -
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The First Digital Computer
The ABC, short for Atanasoff-Berry Computer, began development in 1937 and continued until 1942 at the Iowa State College. -
The Colossus
The Colossus was the first electrical programmable computer, developed by Tommy Flowers. It was created to help the British code breakers read encrypted German messages. -
Harvard Mark 1
Thought up by Harvard Professor Howard Aiken, and designed and built by IBM, the Harvard Mark 1 was a room-sized calculator. It produced mathematical tables but was soon succeeded by electronic stored-program computers. -
The First Stored Program Computer
The early British Computer known as EDSAC is considered being the first stored program electronic computer.
It performed its first calculation on May 6, 1949 and ran the first graphical computer game, nicknamed "Baby". -
UNIVAC 1101
First delivered to the U.S. Government in 1950, The UNIVAC 1101 is known as the first computer that was capable of storing and running a program from memory. -
IBM 650 Magnetic Drum Calculator
IBM introduces the 650 as its first mass-produced computer, selling 450 in only one year. It allowed faster access to stored information and was popular at universities where students learned programming for the first time. -
Johnniac Computer
The RAND Corporation completed 17 computers called, "The Johnniac Computer". It followed the design of Princeton's Institute of Advanced Study.
Though it was completed in 1954, it was repeatedly expanded and developed further throughout it's 13-year lifespan. -
IMB 350
In 1956, the IBM 350 was born as a way for growing companies to track accounting in real time. It could store 3.75 MB of information and was able to transfer 8,800 characters per second across 50, 2-foot diameter disks. In all, this first hard drive ever and its computer components could be bought for $3200 per month. -
SAGE System online
Sage, The first large-scale computer communications network, connected to 23 hardened computer sites in Canada & The U.S.
It's task was to detect incoming Soviet bombers and direct interceptor aircraft to destroy them. -
NEAC 2203
In 1960, The NEAC 2203 went online, It was sold exclusively in Japan and could process alphabetic and Japanese kana characters. Only about 30 were sold . -
Atlas Computer debuts
A joint project of England's Manchester University, Ferranti Computers, and Plessey, Atlas came online 9 years after Manchester's computer lab began exploring transistor technology. Atlas was the fastest computer in the world at the time and introduced the idea of, "virtual memory," which is using a disk as an extension of main memory. -
2116A
HP's first computer was the 2116A, It was developed as an instrument controller for HP's growing list of programmable test and measurement products. -
ARPANET
Introduced in 1969, this was the first technology that can be classifies as cloud computing. With funding from the U.S. Department of Defence, ARPANET became the first viable way to send data through packets. Joseph Carl Robnett Licklider was a huge part of obtaining funding for this project. -
HP-35
In 1971, Hewlett-Packard introduced the HP-35. It was initially designed for use by employees and they were issued a challenge: fit all the features of a desktop scientific calculator into a small enough package to fit in a shirt pocket. It worked and was marketed expertly as, “a fast, extremely accurate electronic slide rule”. The HP-35 helped HP become one of the most dominant companies for handheld calculators. -
The first microprocessor
Intel introduced the first microprocessor, Intel 4004, on November 15, 1971. -
Pong is released
Nolan Bushnell, California Entrepreneur, hires Al Alcorn to design a car driving game that was changed to a simple ping-pong style game. It revolutionized the arcade industry and the video game era. -
Xerox PARC Alto
The Alto was an iconic and revolutionary computer with huge influence on the computer industry. It used windows, a mouse, icons, and worked together over a local network with other Alto's. It could share files and print out documents. It had a word processor known as Bravo, a paint program, a graphics editor and email. -
Cray-1 SuperComputer
The fastest of its day, The Cray-1 SuperComputer's speed partly came from its shape, in the letter C, which reduced the length of wires and therefore, the time signals needed to travel across them. -
Apple II
The Apple II was sold with a main logic board, switching power supply, keyboard, case, manual, game paddles, and cassette tape with the game "breakout." It found popularity well beyond the hobbyist community which made up Apple's community back then. When connected to a colour TV set it produced brilliant graphics for its time. Millions were sold between 1977 and 1933, making it one of the longest lived personal computers. -
Osborne 1
The Osborne 1, weighing 24 pounds and costing $1795, was the first portable computer. Its price was very good, considering it included productivity software worth $1500. It had a 5-inch display, 64 kb of memory, a modem, and two floppy disk drives. -
The Ethernet Adapter
The IBM advanced even more towards the cloud with its introduction of Ethernet. These cables allowed fast connections to online storage and cloud computing. -
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Commodore 64
The C64, as it is better known, was one of the best selling computers of all time - even being recognized by the Guinness book of World Records in 2006 as the greatest selling single computer of ALL TIME. It sold for $595, 64 KB of Ram, and sold more than 22 million uints by the time it was discontinued in 1993. -
Apple introduces Macintosh
In 1984, the Macintosh was introduced with a television commercial during the 1984 super bowl. The ad featured the destruction of big brother - referencing the book 1984 by George Orwell, and using IBM as "big brother." The Macintosh was the first successful mouse driven computer with a graphical user interface and based on the Motorola 68000 microprocessor. Its price was $2500 and came with MacPaint. -
Windows 1.0
Windows 1.0 was officially unveiled on November 20, 1985 and was a 16-bit operating system that required less than 1 MB of memory.
It achieved little popularity. -
Windows 2.0
The next version of Windows OS, Windows 2,0, was launched on December 9, 1987. It took advantage of the expanded memory capabilities of the Intel 386 processor. This version focused on speed and graphics support. -
80486 Microprocessor
Intel released the 80486 microprocessor which contained more than 1 million transistors. What set the 486 apart was its optimized instruction set, with an on-chip unified instruction and data cache and an optional on-chip floating point unit. -
Windows 3.0
Windows 3.0 was released on May 22, 1990 and very soon, became popular. This version came out with enhanced features, was faster, and supported advanced graphics with 16 colours.
Soon, it was succeeded by Windows 3.1 which was launched in 1992 and Windows sold 10 million of these versions together. -
The Newton
the Newton was a handheld computer that was dubbed a "personal data assistant" by Apple President John Scully in 1992. It had many features that paved the way for future handheld computers.
Despite all this, it sold poorly and was discontinued in 1998. -
BeBox
Be releases their first and only product - the BeBox. Using dual powerPC 603 CPUs, and a large variety of peripheral ports. While it did not sell well, the operation system, BeOS, held a loyal following even after Be stopped producing hardware in 1997. -
Windows 95
Windows 95 brought the start menu and start button, in August of 1995. It also introduced the concept of plug-and-play, which is where you connect a peripheral and your computer finds the appropriate drivers for it and it works! Internet Explorer made its debut but in the Windows 95 Plus! pack only. -
Sony Vaio series
the VIAO signalled Sony's entry into the global computer market. The first VAIO, a desktop computer, featured an additional 3D interface on top of the windows 95 operating system as a way of attracting new users. The VAIO line of computers was best known for laptops designed with communications and audio-video capabilities. The line was discontinued in 2014. -
The iMac
The iMac, a range of all-in-one desktop computers, is launched and Apple especially makes itself known with the Bondi Blue iMac, which sells for about $1300. Customers got a machine with a 233-MHz G3 processor, 4GB hard drive, 32MB of Ram, a CD-ROM drive, and a monitor. This was apple's first new product under the leadership of Steve Jobs and many consider this Apple's return from near-bankruptcy in the middle 1990s. -
Windows 98
Released in 1998, as it says in its name, Windows 98 was an upgrade from Windows 95 and came with a bunch of new features like IE 4, Outlook Express, Windows Address Book, Microsoft Chat and Netshow Player, replaced by Windows Media Player later. -
Windows ME
This was considered one of the lowest points for Windows as this OS version was laggy, glitched, and buggy. Some notable programs made their debut such as IE 5.5, Windows Media Player 7, and Windows Movie Maker. -
Windows 2000
Released in February 2000, Windows 2000 was based on Microsoft's business-oriented Windows NT system. With Windows 2000 came automatic updating. -
Windows XP
Windows XP became, arguably, one of the best versions of Windows. Lots of features got visual improvements - The start button became green, The task bar became blue along with other minor visual and shadow effects. Cleartype was introduced, which made text easier to read on LCD Screens. Windows XP is Microsoft's longest running OS, seeing 3 major updates and support for it ran all the way up until 2014, about 13 years from its original release date. -
Arduino
Arduino began as a project of the Interaction Design Institute of Ivrea, Italy. The Arduino used a java-based integrated development environment and users could access a library of programs, called "wiring," that allowed for simplified programming. -
Windows Vista
Windows Vista replaced Windows XP in January of 2007.
With Vista came updated looks with a focus on transparent elements, and security. Windows Media Player and IE 7 debuted as well as Windows Defender. -
MacBook Air
in 2008, Apple introduced their first ultra notebook, a light thin laptop with high-capacity battery. The Air incorporated many of the technologies that were associated with the MacBook line of laptops, including a camera, and Wi-Fi. -
Windows 7
Released in October 2009, its purpose was that it would fix all the issues, bugs, and glitches that Vista faced and an emphasis on user-friendly features. It was more stable, faster, and easier to use making it quickly become a favourite. -
Windows 8
Windows 8, released in October 2012, was Microsoft's most bold overhaul changing a lot of features and completely ditching the start menu and start button in favour of a touch friendly start screen. Windows 8 was faster than previous Windows OS versions and included support for many new types of USB devices. -
Windows 8.1
Windows 8.1 reintroduced the start button, which brought up the start screen, and was released in October 2013 and started a shift towards yearly software updates. -
Windows 10
Announced on September 30, 2014, Windows 10 represents another step in Microsoft's U-Turn, bringing back the Start menu and more traditional desktop features. Windows 10 was designed to unify all Windows platforms across multiple devices with universal apps available from the Windows Store and run on all devices.
