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The Changes to Electrical and Digital Electronics in the last 70 years

First an Idea of Some of the prices people used to pay for electrical items

Westinghouse Wringer washing machine $59.95 North Carolina 1939

Record Player / Radio Combination $59.00 Ohio 1946

Sylvania 17 inch black and white TV $179.95   Wisconsin   1954

9 inch portable TV UHF VHF $99.95 Massachusetts 1965

JVC VHS Video Cassette Recorder $695 New York 1979

The Digital and Electronic Revolution some important milestones
1947
  • The Transistor is invented

  • ENIAC, one of the world's first digital computers, is turned on after a memory upgrade. It will remain in continuous operation until October 2, 1955.

    • 1955
  • First pocket transistor radios available

    • 1958
  • The Microchip first developed in US by Intel

    • 1964
  • BASIC (Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code), an easy to learn high level programming language is introduced.

    • 1969
  • Creation of ARPANET, the predecessor of the Internet

    • 1971
  • Intel releases world's first microprocessor, the 4004.

    • 1972
  • First scientific hand-held calculator (HP-35) introduced (price $395).

    • 1975
  • The name "Micro-soft" (for microcomputer software) and Microsoft becomes a registered trademark

  • The Microcomputer Altair 8800 is released

    • 1976
  • Apple Computer Company is formed by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak

  • Matsushita introduces the VHS home video cassette recorder to compete with Sony's Beta max system.

    • 1977
  • The first Apple II computers went on sale

  • Atari Games Console 2600

    • 1978
  • Space Invaders Launches Craze for Computer Video Games

  • The first computer bulletin board system is created

  • Bell Labs launched a trial of first commercial cellular network

    • 1980
  • Digital Equipment Corporation, Intel and Xerox introduce the DIX standard for Ethernet

  • Release of Pac-Man arcade game

  • First available Domestic Camcorders available in Japan

    • 1981
  • IBM in US launches it's first PC which uses Microsoft Software MS DOS

  • The term INTERNET first mentioned

  • MS-DOS released by Microsoft

    • 1983
  • ARPANET officially changes to use the Internet Protocol, creating the Internet.

  • Lotus 1-2-3 is released

  • IBM releases the IBM PC XT

  • Microsoft Word is first released

  • Swatch introduce their first watches

  • The first hand held mobile phone becomes commercially available

    • 1984
  • The first Apple Macintosh goes on sale

    • 1985
  • The first .Com domain name, symbolics.com, is registered by the Symbolics corporation. However, .edu domains, for educational institutions, still predominate over the commercial .com ones

  • Microsoft Corporation releases the first version of Windows, Windows 1.0.

    • 1986
  • Internet Mail Access Protocol defined for e-mail transfer

  • The 386 series of microprocessor introduced by Intel.

    • 1989
  • The first of 24 satellites of the Global Positioning System is placed into orbit

  • Nintendo begin selling the Game Boy in Japan

  • The 486 series of microprocessor introduced by Intel.

  • First release of Microsoft Office. which was a bundle of Microsoft's office applications, such as Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel , Dependent on the Version you purchased would depend on which applications were included

    • 1991
  • The first GSM Mobile Phone network opened in Europe

  • Internet is made available to unrestricted commercial use and number of computers on the net reaches 1 million

  • Tim Berners-Lee introduces the web browser.

  • Sega Game Gear Handheld

  • Super Nes

    • 1993
  • The Pentium microprocessor introduced by Intel.

  • Windows NT 3.1 released by Microsoft

  • The World Wide Web was born at CERN

    • 1994
  • Worlds First Satellite Digital Television Service Launched

    • 1995
  • Windows 95 released by Microsoft

  • DVD, optical disc storage media format, is announced.

    • 1996
  • Ebay the online auction and shopping website, where people buy and sell goods and services worldwide.

    • 1998
  • The Search Engine Google is founded.

  • Apple Computer unveils the iMac.

  • Nintendo Game Boy Color Handheld

    • 1999
  • The year 2000 problem known as the Y2K problem and the millennium bug was the most important thing on most companies minds in 1999. Critical industries (such as electricity or financial) and government functions could stop working at 12:00 AM, January 1, 2000. This fear was fuelled by the press coverage and other media speculation, as well as corporate and government reports. All over the world companies and organizations checked and upgraded their computer systems.

  • My Space was officially introduced to the Internet

  • Bluetooth announced.

  • The initial release of Napster

    • 2001
  • Wikipedia, a Wiki free content encyclopedia, goes online

  • Apple Computer releases the iPod.

  • Microsoft releases Windows XP

    • 2002
  • Microsoft Xbox Released

  • The Creative Zen digital audio players released