![\"\"](\"http:\/\/greiner.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/IMG-20120324-00061.jpg\" "\\"4004")
<\/a><\/p>\nThe 4004 begat the 8008, the first 8-bit microprocessor.\u00a0 This is the one that truly launched the microcomputer revolution.<\/p>\n
Once the 8008 came out, pretty quickly came the designs for microcomputers based on them.\u00a0 I actually built something similar to this.\u00a0 The 8008 was a beast of chip to use, requiring 3 voltages (+5, +12, -12), and had a single 8-bit bus that was used for everything from memory to i\/o.<\/p>\n I built systems based on several different microprocessors, and then came the era of the single-board computers.\u00a0 And they cost less than building it from scratch!\u00a0 Here’s the manual one that I bought (and still have kicking around somewhere), based on the 6502 chip.\u00a0 It was pretty famous, in it’s day (the late 70’s).<\/p>\n I was poking around the in the unused corners of my basement kingdom (SWMBO rarely lets me play upstairs), and I came across some old manuals.\u00a0 Damn, but they brought back some happy memories!\u00a0 Maybe they’ll do the same for … Continue reading <\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>Then came the era of the 8080 chip, and this was powerful enough to merit its own real operating system.\u00a0 CP\/M filled this void, and it was the first widely-used o\/s.\u00a0 It wasn’t plug-and-play, of course … you still had to customize it to your own system.\u00a0 In assembly language, of course.\u00a0\u00a0 Keep in mind that nothing was standardized in those days!\u00a0 Interesting times, and it all seemed like magic.<\/p>\n<\/a>After CP\/M and the 8080 era came the IBM PC and MS-DOS (which was based in large part on CP\/M).\u00a0 And this ushered in the era of wide-spread software development.\u00a0 One of the “big things” to emerge was Borland and their series of “turbo” languages.\u00a0 The first of these was Turbo Pascal.\u00a0 Pascal, you see, was going to take over and become the One True Language … all the pundits and academics said so.\u00a0 Heck, even the Intel 8088 chip used in the IBM PC’s (from which sprang the 80286, then 80386, then Pentium, and so forth) were designed to optimize running Pascal!\u00a0 The Borland Pascal was unique in that it offered a full IDE (integrated development environment), and really fast compile times.\u00a0 Both of those were unheard of in those days, but are ubiquitous now.<\/p>\n<\/a>And now for something completely different.\u00a0 Hard core techie porn … the fabled GE Transistor Manual.\u00a0 This is the 7th edition from 1964 that I bought as a teenager.\u00a0 Note the $2 price!\u00a0 It was 658 pages of theory and specifications and practical applications.\u00a0 Most of it was above my head as a teen, but was invaluable in college where the theory section actually helped me.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"