History of Computers - Generations of Computers - Class 11 CS/IP Notes

 

History of Computers

Abacus

The history of computer begins with the birth of abacus which is believed to be the first computer. It is said that Chinese invented Abacus around 4,000 years ago.

Napier's Bones

It was a manually-operated calculating device which was invented by John Napier (1550-1617). It was also the first machine to use the decimal point.

Pascaline

Pascaline is also known as Arithmetic Machine or Adding Machine. It was invented between 1642 and 1644 by a French mathematician-philosopher Biaise Pascal. It is believed that it was the first mechanical and automatic calculator.

Difference Engine

In the early 1820s, it was designed by Charles Babbage who is known as "Father of Modern Computer". It was a mechanical computer which could perform simple calculations. 

Analytical Engine

This calculating machine was also developed by Charles Babbage in 1830. It was a mechanical computer that used punch-cards as input.

Generations of Computers

 First Generation Computers

·         The first generation (1946-1959) computers were slow, huge and expensive.

·         In these computers, vacuum tubes were used as the basic components of CPU and memory.

·         These computers were mainly depended on batch operating system and punch cards.

Some of the popular first-generation computers are;

·         ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer)

·         EDVAC (Electronic Discrete Variable Automatic Computer)

·         UNIVACI (Universal Automatic Computer)

·         IBM-701

·         IBM-650

 

 Second Generation Computers

·         The second generation (1959-1965) was the era of the transistor computers.

·         These computers used transistors which were cheap, compact and consuming less power.

·         Assembly language and programming languages like COBOL and FORTRAN, and Batch processing and multiprogramming operating systems were used in these computers.

Some of the popular second-generation computers are;

·         IBM 1620

·         IBM 7094

·         CDC 1604

·         CDC 3600

·         UNIVAC 1108

 

Third Generation Computers

·         The third-generation computers used integrated circuits (ICs) instead of transistors. 

·         These generation computers used remote processing, time-sharing, multi programming as operating system. Also, the high-level programming languages like FORTRON-II TO IV, COBOL, PASCAL PL/1, ALGOL-68 were used in this generation.

Some of the popular third generation computers are;

·         IBM-360 series

·         Honeywell-6000 series

·         PDP (Personal Data Processor)

·         IBM-370/168

·         TDC-316

Fourth Generation Computers

·         The fourth generation (1971-1980) computers used very large scale integrated (VLSI) circuits; 

·         VLSI is a chip containing millions of transistors and other circuit elements.

·         These generation computers used real time, time sharing and distributed operating system. The programming languages like C, C++, DBASE was also used in this generation.

Some of the popular fourth generation computers are;

·         DEC 10

·         STAR 1000

·         PDP 11

·         CRAY-1(Super Computer)

·         CRAY-X-MP (Super Computer)

Fifth Generation Computers

·         In fifth generation (1980-till date) computers, the VLSI technology was replaced with ULSI (Ultra Large-Scale Integration).

·         It made possible the production of microprocessor chips with ten million electronic components. 

·         he programming languages used in this generation were C, C++, Java, .Net, etc.

Some of the popular fifth generation computers are;

·         Desktop

·         Laptop

·         NoteBook

·         UltraBook

·         ChromeBook