New England Data Services Blog

Computer History: From Start to Art

 

I remember my family's first computer was an Apple Macintosh design where playing an 8 bit Oregon Trail was the future and almost seemed it could not get better.  Now, technology has advanced to be smaller, faster, and sleeker where style goes hand and hand with performance.  This blog will show some of the first and older styles of computers up to the latest types.

•·        UNIVAC I

The UNIVAC I was the first commercial computer, but don't think it was ready for a household.  Distributed in June of 1951, the U.S. Census bureau sold 46 of these computers at over $1 million dollars each. It used 5,200 vacuum tubes and consumed 125 kW of power and a mercury delay line capable of storing 1,000 words of 11 decimal digits plus sign (72-bit words) for memory.  I keep in my backpack 2 Gb flash drive just to give some perspective on technology.

•·        Vacuum Tubes to Transistors!

When computers were first being innovated and produced, it was thought the technology would be scarce due to the size, cost and skill to interpret the results.  Transistors came into play and reduce the size and the cost.  Transistors made the switching of ones and zeros to the speed of millionth even billionth per second.  The IBM 1401 was now being produced on a worldwide scale and captured one third of the computer market.

•·        The Beyond

Microchip and the Microprocessor took the computer to the levels of which we see today.  This was around the 1960's where only businesses, universities, and computer centers for industry.  Although other computers were out with similar technology, Steve Wozniak was credited for developing the first home computer called the Apple I. 

So that is the basic history of the computer.  Now, Here are some pictures and descriptions of some of the newest technology and some interesting looking computers.

The Macbook Air is a ultrathin laptop, no thicker than your index finger, that also provides high resolution pictures and a 120Gb hard drive.

This is the actual thinnest laptop in the world.  The Dell Adamo is the 0.65-inch thick and weighs four pounds.  The Adamo is also powered by a 1.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, has 2GB RAM, 128GB solid state drive.

The Singulum Laptop.  The options include your choice of exotic wood, ivory or gold keyboard and even a Diamond track point tip.

This is the Asus Bamboo Laptop Computer.  The shell of the computer is made of bamboo in effort to become more eco-friendly, but it also includes 12.1-inch screen, Intel Core 2 Duo microprocessor, and Microsoft's Windows Vista Operating System.

This is the Tsunami Dream.  Personally, I have not seen a problem with this computer yet and it has style like no other.  It runs incredibly fast and has all the latest technology on it.

These are just a few computers that have caught my eye.  Comment on past or present computers that you have experienced or seen a concept of.

What Is Safe Mode?

So you sit down in front of your computer, turn it on, and you start to hear the Jaws music?!?!?! It gets louder and louder until, the Blue Screen of Death (BSoD) appears on your monitor. It says that your Windows system has been shut down to prevent any further damage. Most of the time, the BSoD appears without any sign of the problem before. Usually it has to do with a recent software or hardware driver installation. It seems pretty ridiculous that you have no way of recovering your system because of the driver for your new USB keyboard had bugs in it. What can you do?

Luckily Windows put in an advanced startup option called Safe Mode. Essentially, this starts up the operating system, but with very simple drivers. Windows boots to a file called system.cb instead of the normal system file. This loads virtual device drivers that can communicate with parts of the computer.

Once in Safe Mode, you can locate and fix the problems with tools like the Device Manager. Safe Mode usually recognizes your wireless and wired Ethernet cards so you can connect to the internet and download the newest device drivers for your hardware if this was the source of the problem. If the problem comes from a recently installed program you can use the Add/Remove Programs.

In addition to a graphical to the Safe Mode, you can also boot Safe Mode with the Command Prompt. If you know there is a corrupted file due to a virus or malware, you can navigate through the directory structure, delete the corrupted files, and replace them with copies of the clean version. This method usually works best with problems due to corruption in the system files or registry.

What Is Cache?

So you’re sitting at your desk to doing some work. You are just about to sign a contract, but there is no pen on your desk. Remembering that the company keeps all the pens 3 floors down in the warehouse, you jump up to go get one. Finally, you arrive back at your desk with a pen, sign the contract and return the pen to the warehouse. Ten minutes later, another contract comes in and you need the pen again. Now you have to go back down 3 flights of stairs, get the pen, and bring it back to your desk. I get tired of people explaining how computers work with all the technical terms, so I will continue to use this office situation throughout this explanation.

 

Essentially, this is how a computer works between the guy working at the desk (the CPU) and the warehouse (RAM) where your necessities are stored. Unfortunately, the design of a computer does not allow the RAM to be right next to the CPU. When the CPU must perform a task, a signal has to travel from the CPU to the RAM, locate the desired action or information stored in a memory location, and bring it back to the CPU where it is processed. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a storage place right on the desk to keep pens?

 

Cache is a small memory system built right on CPU to eliminate the need to travel to the RAM for frequently used processes or information. Cache is a very small size and does not hold large files. A small and frequently used process like adding two numbers is a task that can be stored on the cache. In our office example, something like a pen could be stored on our desk (cache) because of its small size and frequent use.

 

Sometimes your desk just gets too cluttered and you need to clean it off. This occasionally needs to be done with cache memory. Filling up your cache slows your computer down and makes it so the CPU has to travel all the way back to the RAM again. If your desk is filled up, you can’t really find anything and you have to go back to the warehouse to get another pen.

 

You may be asking why the cache doesn’t just store all of the information of the computer so RAM is not needed, right? The reason is that cache is very expensive. In other words, we use the small amount of cache to speed up the larger amount of RAM. In other words it is much cheaper to use a warehouse for storage than buying desks to fit everything in your warehouse.