Computer Timeline


	90's \| 80's \| 70's \| 60's \| 50's

1996	Ted Hoff, Stan Mazer, and Federico Faggin, co-inventors of the microprocessor, are inducted into the Inventors Hall of fame.

1995	Intel introduces the Pentium Pro processor. By mid 1995, an exploding Internet links more than 7 million computers and tens of millions of users world wide.

1994	Apple launches its first PC's based on Motorola's new PowerPC processor: The Power Macintosh 6100, 7100, and 8100. Intel launches its first overdrive chip - the P24T.

1993	Intel launches the Pentium Processor. Dataquest, a noted market research firm, ranks Intel as the world's largest producer of semi-conductors - the first time a U.S. firm had the distinction since 1984.

1992	Cyrix launches a series of microprocessors that are compatible with Intel chips.

1991	Intel launches the Intel Inside campaign.

1990	The World Wide Web was born when Tim Berners-Lee, a researcher at CERN, the high-energy physics laboratory in Geneva, developed HyperText Markup Language (HTML). Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) acknowledges it is actively developing a clone of Intel's i386 chip.


1989	Intel launches a technological milestone: the i486 microprocessor, featuring some 1.2 million transistors.

1988	Intel embarks on a joint venture with the People's Republic of China to manufacture 16-bit and 32-bit microprocessors.

1987	IBM introduced its PS/2 machines, which made the 3 1/2-inch floppy disk drive and video graphics array standard for IBM computers. Intel co-founder Robert Noyce receives the National Medal of Honor from President Ronald Reagan.

1986	As a result of legal dispute between Intel and NEC, a U.S. court rules that microcode is protected and that Intel's copyrights are valid.

1985	The modern Internet gained support when the National Science foundation formed the NSFNET, linking five supercomputer centers at Princeton University, Pittsburgh, University of California at San Diego, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and Cornell University. Intel launches the i386 processor. Aldus announced its PageMaker program for use on Macintosh computers, launching an interest in desktop publishing.

1984	Apple Computer launched the Macintosh, the first successful mouse-driven computer with a graphic user interface, with a single $1.5 million commercial during the 1984 Super Bowl. The 3 1/2-inch "microfloppy" diskette won widespread acceptance, aided by Apple Computer's decision to integrate its use into the new Macintosh. Motorola launches the 68010 microprocessor. In his novel "Neuromancer," William Gibson coined the term "cyberspace."

1983	Microsoft announced Word, originally called Multi-Tool Word, and Windows. Intel builds the first wafer containing 25 million bits of information. Apple introduced its Lisa. The first personal computer with a graphical user interface, its development was central in the move to such systems for personal computers.

1982	The use of computer-generated graphics in movies took a step forward with Disney's release of "Tron." Intel launches the 80286 processor, which features 134,000 transistors and a 16-bit data bus. Mitch Kapor developed Lotus 1-2-3, writing the software directly into the video system of the IBM PC.

1981	Adam Osborne completed the first portable computer, the Osborne I, which weighed 24 pounds and cost $1,795. IBM launches its first PC, based on the Intel 8088 chip. The MS-DOS, or Microsoft Disk Operating System, the basic software for the newly released IBM PC, established a long partnership between IBM and Microsoft, which Bill Gates and Paul Allen had founded only six years earlier.

1980	Seagate Technology created the first hard disk drive for microcomputers. The disk held 5 megabytes of data, five times as much as a standard floppy disk, and fit in the space of a floppy disk drive. John Shoch and Jon Hupp at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center invented the computer "worm," a short program that searched a network for idle processors. Intel launches the 8087, the first math coprocessor. The first optical data storage disk had 60 times the capacity of a 5 1/4-inch floppy disk.


1979	Intel launches the 8088 processor, which contains a record 29,000 transistors.

1978	The 5 1/4-inch floppy disk became the standard medium for personal computer software after Apple Computer and Tandy Radio Shack introduced disk drives for this format Fledgling company Texas Instruments, one of the few high-tech companies not located in what would become known as "Silicone Valley," launches the TMS-4164, a 64-kilobyte (KB) memory chip.

1977	The U.S. government adopted IBM's data encryption standard, the key to unlocking coded messages, to protect confidentiality within its agencies. The Apple II became an instant success when released in 1977 with its printed circuit motherboard, switching power supply, keyboard, case assembly, manual, game paddles, A/C powercord, and cassette tape with the computer game "Breakout."

1976	The first 16-bit microprocessor, the TMS 9900, is released by Texas Instruments.

1974	Researchers at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center designed the Alto -- the first work station with a built-in mouse for input. The microprocessor market heats up with the introduction by Motorola of the 6800 chip. Scelbi advertised its 8H computer, the first commercially advertised U.S. computer based on a microprocessor, Intel's 8008.

1973	Robert Metcalfe devised the Ethernet method of network connection at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center. The TV Typewriter, designed by Don Lancaster, provided the first display of alphanumeric information on an ordinary television set.

1972	Nolan Bushnell introduced Pong and his new company, Atari video games. Intel's 8008 microprocessor made its debut.

1971	The Kenbak-1, the first personal computer, advertised for $750 in Scientific American. An IBM team led by Alan Shugart invented the 8-inch floppy diskette. Intel develops the 4004 chip (the world's first microprocessor).

1970	Citizens and Southern National Bank in Valdosta, Ga., installed the country's first automatic teller machine. Computer-to-computer communication expanded when the Department of Defense established four nodes on the ARPANET: the University of California, Santa Barbara and UCLA, SRI International, and the University of Utah.


1969	Bell Laboratories programmers Kenneth Thompson and Dennis Ritchie developed the UNIX operating system on a spare DEC minicomputer. The RS-232-C standard for communication permitted computers and peripheral devices to transmit information serially -- that is, one bit at a time.

1968	The Apollo Guidance Computer System made its debut orbiting the Earth on Apollo 7.

1967	Seymour Papert designed LOGO as a computer language for children.

1965	Digital Equipment Corp. introduced the PDP-8, the first commercially successful minicomputer.

1964	Thomas Kurtz and John Kemeny created BASIC, an easy-to-learn programming language, for their students at Dartmouth College. Online transaction processing made its debut in IBM's SABRE reservation system, set up for American Airlines.

1963	Ivan Sutherland published Sketchpad, an interactive, real time computer drawing system, as his MIT doctoral thesis. ASCII: (American Standard Code for Information Interchange) permitted machines from different manufacturers to exchange data.

1962	Virtual memory emerged from a team under the direction of Tom Kilburn at the University of Manchester.

1960	Virtual memory emerged from a team under the direction of Tom Kilburn at the University of Manchester. A team drawn from several computer manufacturers and the Pentagon developed COBOL, Common Business Oriented Language.


1959	Robert Noyce's practical integrated circuit, invented at Fairchild Camera and Instrument Corp., allowed printing of conducting channels directly on the silicon surface. ERMA, the Electronic Recording Method of Accounting, digitized checking for the Bank of America by creating a computer-readable font.

1958	SAGE -- Semi-Automatic Ground Environment -- linked hundreds of radar stations in the United States and Canada in the first large-scale computer communications network. Jack Kilby created the first integrated circuit at Texas Instruments to prove that resistors and capacitors could exist on the same piece of semiconductor material. Japan's NEC built the country's first electronic computer, the NEAC 1101.

1956	The era of magnetic disk storage dawned with IBM's shipment of a 305 RAMAC to Zellerbach Paper in San Francisco. At MIT, researchers began experimentation on direct keyboard input on computers, a precursor to today's normal mode of operation.

1955	Bell Laboratories announced the first fully transistorized computer, TRADIC.

1954	The IBM 650 magnetic drum calculator established itself as the first mass-produced computer, with the company selling 450 in one year.

1953	IBM shipped its first electronic computer, the 701.