The Generations of Computers

Computer did not just become what it is today. A lot of work and research went into its design and development. Many people we are involved in each stage of its development. The computer generations refer to this development and periods of the development of the computer. The need to the development of Computer was necessitated by the need to improve on information technology.

Information Technology: information is needed in virtually all human endeavours, thoughts and actions to plan the family, make expenses and for business organisation in decision making. Data are all facts or events which have no meaning. It could be facts about persons, objects, places or things. Until the past through some manipulation or process to organise them, data convey no sense or message. When they are processed data results to information. Information is the result obtained from processed data. It has meaning which can be communicated as a message, knowledge or news. Search information can be data, images text, documents and voice. Information technology is the application of computers and telecommunication equipment for automatic processing of information. Generally information technology is the combination of computers, communication equipment and other technologies associated with automation.

Information communication Technologies: information communication technologies date back to history from the Babylonian times in 3599 BC, when record keeping was clay tablets, to the typical rural African societies, we are information dissemination was through town criers, to the error of preserving information in writing on scroll, then the art of printing was invented would you became the most effective and widespread system of communication for a long time. With industrialisation came various information transmission technologies or what we call today communication technology.

Generations of Computers: generations of computers refers to different developmental stages of the computer with specific characteristics in each generation. Before this classification there had been several works involving computing devices. All these fall under what is known as zeroth generation.

First Generation Computers: The first generation of computers refers to the period from 1940 to 1956 as the period of development. The characteristics include the following;

1. Vacuum tubes used machine language to perform operations.
2. input was based on punched cards and paper tapes, and output was displayed on printouts.
3. magnetic drums we are used as storage devices
4. they were very expensive to operate
5. they used a lot of electricity
6. degenerated a lot of heat and this made them prone to malfunction and failure
7. The storage capacity was too low
8. they were heavy and bulky and could occupy an entire room

The first generation computers were of low speed in operation they could only solve one problem at a time. The examples of first generation computers include;

1. Harvard Mark 1 (ASCC- Automatic Sequence Controlled Computer) whirlwind
2. EDSAC
3. RCA BIZMAC
4. NCR(National Cash Register) series
5. Honeywell
6. Burroughs E101, Burroughs 220
7. IBM (International Business Machines) series

Second Generation Computers: The second generation computer is refer to the period 1956 to 1963 as the period of development. Dear characteristics include;

1. Transistors we are used. A transistor is a device that is composed of semiconductor material that amplifies a signal or opens or closes a circuit. Transistor was invented in 1947 at bell labs in the United States of America
2. they were faster and cheaper
3. they were more energy efficient and more reliable than the first generation computers
4. They stored their instructions in their memory
5. they had higher storage capacity having employed magnetic core technology
6. they also used punched cards for input
7. output was on printouts
8. they used assembly language

Examples of second generation computers include;

1. UNIVAC 1107, UNIVAC III
2. RCA 501
3. Philco Transact S-2000
4. NCR 300 series
5. IBM 7030 stretch
6. IBM 7070, 7080, 7090, 1400 series, 1600 series
7. Honeywell 800, 400 series
8. General electric GE 635, 645, GE 200
9. Control data corp CDC 1604, 3600, 160A
10. LARC
11. Burroughs B5000, 200 series

Third Generation Computers: Third generation computers refer to the period 1964 to 1971. Some of the characteristics of the third generation computers include;

1. The employed large scale integration circuits(LSI). An integrated circuit is developed by miniaturizing transistors and placing many of them on silicon chips. This is known as large scale integration
2. they used keyboards for input and monitors for output
3. The oppressions we are interfaced with an operating system which allowed the device to run many different applications at the same time
4. they were smaller, more efficient and faster
5. they had higher processing capacity
6. they had a higher storage capacity than their predecessors
7. they were more affordable than they are predecessors

Examples of the third generation computers include;

1. Burroughs 6700
2. Control Data 3300, 6600, 7600
3. Honeywell 200
4. IBM system /360, system 3, system 7
5. NCR Century Series
6. RCA Spectra 70 series
7. UNIVAC 9000 series
8. General Electric GE 600 series, GE 235

Fourth Generation Computers: The fourth generation computers refer to the period from 1971 to present day. Their characteristics include;

1. The employed very large scale integrated circuits
2. multiple microprocessors we are built on a single board
3. This generation of computers were faster and smaller
4. they were more reliable
5. they had greater processing capability
6. they had higher storage capacity than the third generation computers
7. they used graphical user interface(GUI’s), the mouse and handheld devices
8. they used magnetic storage devices like hard drive, floppy drive and DVD
9. they were cheaper than their predecessors

Examples of fourth generation computers include the following;

1. IBM system 3090, IBM RISC 6000, IBM RT
2. ILLIAC IV
3. Cray 2 XMP
4. Hewlett Packard 9000

The Fifth Generation Computers: The fifth generation computers refers to the present period and beyond. The fifth generation computers combined some or all of the following technologies

1. They have extreme large scale integration
2. they are parallel in processing
3. they have high speed logic and memory chips
4. they are high in performance and micro miniaturizing
5. they have voice or data integration, knowledge based platforms
6. they have artificial intelligence, expert systems concepts
7. virtual reality
8. satellite links

In summary, we have five generations of computers. Easy generation has more advanced features than the preceding one. The 5th generation is the present generation of computers and it is knowledge based, problem solving and has intelligent attributes.