Innovations of the 50’s
Modem (1950) SAGE used for North America Air Defense Bell 101 dataset standard not commercially distributed until later decades
Optical Fibres (1954) Fiber-optic communication Imaging bundles Glass clad fibres Communication Medical uses- endoscopes
Hard Drive (1956) First computer company to use the hard drive was IMB. Their computer was called the IBM 305 RAMAC. The hard drive replaced the usage of punch cards. The computer weighed over a ton, and stored about 5MB of data.
Satellite (1957) GPS, TV signals and phone calls. Broadcast location sends signal to satellite in orbit, the satellite bounces back signal to a receiver. Long distance communication would dramatically slow down without satellites.
Tennis-For-Two (1958) First graphical video game and was the first video game created for entertainment. Built for an analogue computer and was displayed on an oscilloscope. Controlled with knobs and a button. Showed the popularity of an electronic computer game. Tennis-for-two helped spawn the video game industry.
Microchip (1959) Small unit of packaged circuits Uses Binary to communicate with device Without the Microchip, modern day devices would have been impossible.
MIT Whirlwind line of computers (1951) The fastest computers ever made First simulation technology Users could interact with a computer with a keyboard for the first time ever SAGE-computer (1958) The largest computer ever made Used to detect air attacks and bombs It could communicate to other computers around the country. This idea directly influenced the creators of ARPANET, the predecessor of the internet.
IBM IBM Computers were mainly used for government and scientific purposes. ●The IBM 701 was for government work and research. ●IBM also invented a commercial “chain” printer.