In 1849 Charles Babbage built what is considered to be the world’s first computer. It had over 8,000 parts, measuring 11 feet long with a weight of 5 tonnes. This computer however, was manually driven via a handle that the user would have to rotate in order to get the desired output making it a mechanical calculator. The main reason for the making of this computer was to illuminate human error, The machine would print out the accurate numbers, and also imprint them onto a soft material for recall later. The military was behind the first computer as they wanted to be able to predict where enemy missiles would land.
In 1939 the Hp audio oscillator 200 (Created by Hewlett) was used as an instrument which generates one tone or frequency at any one time. Over the years the Oscillator were used for telephones, radios and other audio equipment. This was also an analogue computer. The problem with it was that it had to obtain a constant level of output over a full decade frequency range. However this was solved by inserting a non-linear element, which would control the feedback.
The 40’s was a very busy year for the history of computing. In 1941 the Zuse Z3 which Konrad Zuse made was the worlds first working programmable computer. Before this, computers would have to be pre-programmed. Project Whirlwind was created in 1943 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It was the first real-time computer which also used video displays as an output. It was used during WW2 to train plane bombers. It was the first flight simulator, before this, pilots had to train in a real plane. This would be very dangerous and would cause a lot of un-necessary deaths, but with the flight simulator you could train pilots without them being at risk of killing themselves. Also in 1943, the colossus was made by Tommy Flowers to break codes and decipher encrypted German messages during World War 2. It was used to find possible key combinations for the Lorenz machine (The German encryption machine).
A year later, in 1944 the Harvard Mk 1 was devised by Howard H. Aiken and was built at IBM. It began doing computer calculations for the US Navy. It was described as being “the beginning of the era of modern computer”.
1950 was the year that the computer started getting smaller, specifically for home use. The British believed that computing was for large businesses. However, computing would be a great addition to the home. The NBS Seac was the first small-scale computer which was designed quickly.
Ten years later in 1960, the Dec pdp 1 was made, it was the first personal computer, which had a monitor as an output. This computer developed the very first games. Pong was the first game created on this computer. It originated as a radar demonstrator, it was then tweaked into a 2D game. Spacewar was the first 3D game created on the Dec pdp 1. This was the start of the computer gaming era.
The altair 8800 was made in 1975 and was the very first console especially created for gaming purposes. The problem with it was that it took ages to load and every time you died you would have to wait for it to reload.
In 1977 the Atari Vcs prototype was made. This revolutionised the gaming console as it was the very first prototype designed specifically with gaming in mind, as the Altair 8800 was very slow, the Atari Vcs was much quicker. The Atari Vcs was the beginning of the gaming revolution.
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