The PC is 40 years old
The success story of the PC started 40 years ago and was replaced by smartphones and tablets in 2007. In order to be able to follow this fascinating story, Robert and Micha Weiss developed a poster back in 1997, which is now available in its 5th greatly expanded edition ("History of Digital Evolution").
At the beginning of the 1970s, kits and hobbyist systems such as KIM-1, AIM 65, Ohio Scentific, Altair and IMSAI kicked off the PC era, but from 1977 onwards, companies such as Apple, Commodore and Tandy Corporation made it possible for private users to enter the computer age without any problems.
The role of the West Coast Computer Fair
On April 16-17, 1977, Jim Warren and Bob Reiling organized a trade show in San Francisco at the Civic Auditorium to popularize the emerging home computer. It would soon become the most important trade show for the nascent personal computer industry. At this fair, a certain Chuck Peddle showed an all-in-one device called the Commodore PET (Personal Electronic Transactor) and two young computer enthusiasts named Steve Wonzniak (27) and Steve Jobs (21) showed a well-built Apple II. 180 exhibitors, including Intel, MITS and Digital Research showed their revolutionary products and ideas to the 12,000 visitors.
The West Coast Computer Fair continued to be a source of new announcements. For example, at the 4th edition (May 79), Dan Bricklin introduced the first spreadsheet, "VisiCalc". Or at the 5th edition (March 1980) Microsofts showed its first hardware product, the Z-80 SoftCard, which gave the Apple II CP/M capability (operating system by Gary Kildall of Digital Research). And a year later, Adam Osborne announced the first transportable, 11 kilogram, computer, the Osborne 1 (designer Lee Felsenstein). Or at the 7th edition (March 1982) the Winchester hard disk with 5 MB from Davong Systems for the IBM PC (announced in August 1981) experienced its baptism.
From the basic developments of the PC to today's everyday life
Around all these basic developments, a large industry was built up worldwide in a short time, whose products and services were to fundamentally change our daily lives in business as well as in private life. But most people never realized this fact, because mobile devices, wireless communication and the Internet are part of everyday life. To illustrate this rapid development, the first PC history poster was created in 1997 to mark the 20th anniversary of the PC. To keep up with the pace of constant innovation, the poster had to be changed, updated and expanded again and again.
From computer history to digital evolution
This is already the 5th poster by Micha and Robert Weiss on the history of digital evolution. Increased requests for when an updated poster would be released (last edition 2009) prompted them to produce a greatly expanded new edition. The redesign includes an extensive expansion of the prehistory from the beginnings of writing, numbers and arithmetic to the birth pangs of the PC. Furthermore, the future section was significantly expanded with the help of the IBM research laboratory in Rüschlikon. The focus of the content has also been set in line with the latest trends. Cognitive computing, cloud computing, 3D printers, security, wearables, virtual worlds, big data and tablet computing are all of great importance.
Dimensions and use
The new two-part poster is a total of 256 cm long and 90 cm high. It includes around 1,500 images, logos and graphic elements, over 30,000 words with around 215,000 characters. If this content were converted into a book in A4 format, the result would be between 550 and 600 pages. The poster is suitable for schools as illustrative material, for anyone interested in computers and technology as a reference work and, thanks to its high-quality printing, also as a decorative element in any office, computer room, classroom or even at home.
The link www.computerposter.ch/download.html allows a detailed view of the poster and under www.computerposter.ch it can also be ordered.
