In 1837, Charles Babbage, a British professor of mathematics described his
idea for the Analytical Engine, the first stored-program mechanical computer.
The Analytical Engine was designed to be powered by a steam engine and was to
use Punched Cards, which was used to program mechanical looms at the time.
What made the Analytical Engine unique was that it was designed to be
programmed. It was because of this and the fact that it would be more than 100
years that any similar devices would be constructed, Charles Babbage, would be
considered by many as the "father of computing". Because of legal, financial,
and political obstacles, the Analytical Machine would never be completed.
Charles Babbage was also difficult to work with and alienated the supporters of
his work.
In 1939, John V. Atanasoff and Clifford Berry developed the Atanasoff-Berry
Computer (ABC) at Iowa State University, which was regarded as the first
electronic digital computer. The ABC was built by hand and the design used over
300 Vacuum Tubes and had capacitors fixed in a mechanically rotating drum for
memory.
The ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer),
constructed in the US in 1943, is widely regarded as the first functionally
useful electronic general-purpose computer. Influenced by the ABC, it was a
turning point in the history of computing and was used to perform ballistics
trajectory calculations and used 160 kW of power. World War II is known to be
the driving force of computing hardware development and one of such use of
computers was in communications encryption and decryption.
The UNIVAC I (Universal Automatic Computer) was the first commercially
available, "mass produced" electronic computer manufactured by Remington Rand in
the USA and was delivered to the US Census Bureau in June 1951. It used 5,200
vacuum tubes and consumed 125 kW of power. 46 machines were sold at more than $1
million each.
The microprocessor eventually led to the development of the microcomputer,
small, low-cost computers that individuals and small businesses could afford. By
the 1990s, the microcomputer or Personal Computer (PC) became a common household
appliance, and became even more widespread with the advent of the Internet.
The ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer),
constructed in the US in 1943, is widely regarded as the first functionally
useful electronic general-purpose computer. Influenced by the ABC, it was a
turning point in the history of computing and was used to perform ballistics
trajectory calculations and used 160 kW of power. World War II is known to be
the driving force of computing hardware development and one of such use of
computers was in communications encryption and decryption.