Stephany Correa-Diaz

P #3 5/30/14

Our Data Processors Over Time

You sit down in your desk chair, pressing the start button. When you hear the sound of my roaring engine, you reach for my modish mouse, to the right of my kempt keyboard, and unlock the world of media. Call me Mac, for I am the captivating computer, and my story is a scintillating one.

To begin with, I appeared around 3000 BC, but I don't have the appearance of the computer you may see in your house. The first computer is the Abacus, a structure that used beads on rods to count and calculate, and is still used a lot in Asia. As decades passed, the Jacquard Loom was created in the 19th century. This loom used metal cards with punched holes to guide the process. It is also the first manufactured computer, and first stored program (the metal cards), which is still in use today. Time cruised on again, giving the Analytical Engine time to be programmed by Ada Augusta, who was also the first remarkable programmer. This appliance actually stored numbers, is steam powered, and was significantly accurate to six decimal places! Even without electricity, computers of this time were miraculously made, and helped others to achieve at mathematics.

Furthermore, many more versions of me were made when the spark of energy to power our electronics was discovered. You may know have heard about the UNIVAC built in 1951, but boy, was that a humongous form of me! I could fill up whole rooms, cost $1,600,000, but only had 100 megabytes on a hard drive! Despite these characteristics, that was the first and only commercially available computer, so people had to set the negative aspects, and employ themselves on me. Just don't get me started on vacuum tubes. I was told those pipes filled whole buildings, but are only glass tubes with circuits inside and no air is swimming around, to protect the center of these channels. As you can see, first generation computers were all voltaic and big, no, gigantic!

In addition, someone finally came up with the fantastic idea of making me smaller, which is why so many folks have their own electronic brain. In 1971, a phenomenal inventor crafted Intel 4004, the first microprocessor, which was first meant to be a calculator brain. A microprocessor, or microchip, is a circuit containing all functions of a computer CPU, but this one was a powerful as a building size computer from the past!The IBM PC was then invented in 1981 as the first wide selling personal computer used in business. It was the size of a briefcase, not including the monitor, and was priced at $1,595. Afterwards, in 1977, the Apple II was released, and was operated in many schools. Since Apple wanted more, in 1984, the Macintosh, my present form, was shown to the awed world, for I was the turning point in computer history. I was a different appliance, for I had a pointing device (the mouse I came with), and a graphical user interface. What is a graphical user interface, you say? A GUI is items such as windows, icons, and menus on a computer. Inhabitants from all over were rushing to buy me, why? I was only about $4,000! What luck! From then on, all computers were personal and cheaper. Yet, this is not the end of my chapter, but only the beginning, because there is still so much to add to my design, to my world.

In conclusion, computers are a wonderful invention, coming from wood and hand operated to electric and automatic. My development is truly a marvel. Next time you ever think about how computers are so common these days, consider how in the past this phenomenon would be the last thing a human would even envision for the future! Know that you are a very lucky person to have my wonders within your reach.